


Nightwing & Flamebird

by Mithen



Series: Earth & Sky [2]
Category: DCU - Comicverse
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-04-01
Updated: 2007-07-26
Packaged: 2017-10-13 13:56:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 40,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/138129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mithen/pseuds/Mithen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One Year Later.  Wonder Woman plans the composition of the new Justice League with Superman and Batman;  Clark and Bruce discuss their relationship;  and plans are put into motion in Kandor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [夜翼与火焰鸟](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6746233) by [gatling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gatling/pseuds/gatling)



Diana sifted through the files on the table in front of her.  Looking down, she could see familiar black-gloved hands going through the folder on Red Tornado on one side of her;  well-known bare hands, strong as steel, examining Conner Hawke's portfolio on the other side.  They were meeting here in the cave for the first time in a year to discuss their options for a new Justice League.

"I still say go with Harper over Hawke," the man on her left said.  "He's a more proven entity.  And Dick trusts him."  Bruce Wayne's voice was the same level baritone it had always been, but Diana could hear, far underneath, an undercurrent of warmth that still surprised her.  Bruce had seemed...different...since coming back on his trip around the world.  When she had noted it, he had merely shrugged and said, "I got the bat-god exorcised," as if that explained everything.

And then he had smiled at her.  A real smile, un-self-conscious and true, warming his dark eyes.

Something had happened to Bruce in the last year, but Diana wasn't sure if exorcism was enough to explain it.

"Hawke might not have the history Harper does, but he's proven himself in the League in the past," the man on her right countered.  Clark Kent had taken a very different path in the last year.  Stripped of his powers, he had gone through a difficult divorce and had used his reporter status to chase down stories far too risky for a non-powered man to tackle.  Clark's demons had never been as openly on display as Bruce's, but something had been driving him through the year as if with whips.  Finally, just a month ago, he had been taken prisoner in Central Asia and brutally tortured.  Bruce had gone to his rescue and when it mattered, when they would have died without them, his powers had finally re-manifested.  Superman was back in action.

And now Diana and her friends were gathered around a table talking about re-organizing the League.  Everything was back to normal.

She found herself drumming her fingers nervously on a picture of Beast Boy and stopped herself with an effort.

The debate about the team archer was continuing on either side of her.  Clark and Bruce seemed more comfortable with each other than they had for years, and she supposed she should be thankful for that.  They were finishing each other's thoughts, responding to half-spoken implications, the conversation flashing by her almost faster than she could follow.  The animosity that had marked so many of their interactions in the past seemed to have evaporated, and yet some kind of tension was still there.  Diana frowned to herself.

"I'll grant you Harper's a fighter!"  Clark laughed lightly, his blue eyes bright as he smiled at Bruce.  "I mean, remember the way he tried to avenge his old man--'Go to hell, demon,' right?"  He was clearly quoting a voice filled with horror and anger.  His own voice remained light and mocking.  A small smile curved his perfect mouth and Diana suddenly felt unease grip her, seizing her by the throat...

"Clark," said Batman, very softly, and the smile was wiped from Superman's face abruptly.  He took a shaky breath and the sense of dread pulled back from the room.

"Damn, Bruce, I'm...I'm sorry...damn..."  He looked down at the pictures in his hands--Ollie, Roy, Conner, Mia--and his hands clenched convulsively on them.  "Rao," he whispered, and Diana was alarmed to see tears standing in his eyes.

"Kal, are you all right?"  She reached out and touched his arm, and he flinched slightly.

"Am I--yes.  I'm fine, Diana.  I'm just--sorry."

"Maybe we should take a break," said Batman matter-of-factly.  He reached out and gently extricated the trembling photographs from Kal's hands.  "Shall we pick up on the archer issue from tomorrow?"

Diana gave Bruce a questioning look, but he seemed entirely unruffled.  "Very well," she said, knowing her concern showed on her face and not caring.  She moved toward the exit, stopping once to look back.  Superman was still staring down at the pile of folders, hands balled into fists and resting on the files.  Batman was looking at him, his cowled face unreadable.

Diana turned and made her way out of the cave.  The Trinity was back together, soon the JLA would be back together.  Everything was back to normal. 

She tried not to think of the icy smile on Kal's face.

Everything was back to normal.

: : :

Into the silence after Diana was gone, Bruce spoke:  "Don't do that."

Clark flinched as through Batman had struck him.  "I didn't mean to--to remember--I've only had a month to process all those memories, you've had a year!"

"You can't let them interfere with our lives here and now, Clark."

Clark's hands trembled on the pile of portfolios.  "I try, but they--I can't always keep them safely locked up.  I want to forget this--" He thumped the pile of files gently, "--but I want to remember..."  His blue eyes were hungry on Bruce's face.  "I want to remember us." 

"Them,"  Bruce corrected him.  "It wasn't us.  We're separate, we're not them.  You're not him."

"I know," Clark whispered.  "But the memories I want to keep and the memories I can't bear...they're all tangled together."  He inhaled sharply.  "I don't want to remember how I killed Roy Harper.  I don't want to remember how we used Robin to lure him to where we could kill him.  But I remember--"  His voice dropped lower, tight with something too strong to leash.  "--I remember how right after, right there against that old oak--"  His voice broke and suddenly Bruce was up against a column, Superman's leg between his, pressing urgently, coaxingly, the dark cowl off and Clark's hands in his hair, tilting his head back to kiss his throat, his breath fast and hot.  "All the things I remember that I've never done with you...how you've never sucked me off but I know how good your mouth feels--" 

Clark's tongue explored that mouth ravenously and Bruce made a rattling noise, yanking him closer, devouring. 

Clark pulled back eventually just enough to talk, his voice going softer, his lips brushing Bruce's, "I remember waking up next to you almost every morning for almost all my life, and yet I've never seen the morning sun on your sleeping face.  Not once."

Bruce looked at him through lash-veiled eyes, dark with emotion.  "We'll do all those things ourselves, Clark.  We'll make our own memories.  Ours, not theirs.  We'll make...a space for ourselves."

"I know."  Clark's mouth was resting on the curve of Bruce's ear now, his voice no more than a whisper.  "Someday we'll have time for all of it again, the reality and not the illusion, mithen."

Bruce's eyes opened wider at the endearment and he pulled away to look closely at Clark.  "Mithen." 

"It's Krypton's smaller moon, it means something like 'beloved'--"

"I know what it means, Clark."  Bruce's tone was patient, maybe a touch amused.  "But..."  His eyes flickered.  "He never called him that."

Clark reached up to trace the line of Bruce's jaw, very lightly, feeling the other man shiver the tiniest bit.  "He couldn't.  Saturn Queen and the others...never taught him Kryptonian, never let him learn the language or the culture.  He could never say--"  Kryptonese like starlight, shot through with warmth, < You are my heart, my long-yearned-for, my mist-veiled light in the darkness, my mithen. >

Bruce looked at him for a long time in silence, his hands on Clark's shoulders.  "Kal," he said.  He spoke in the language he alone among humans could speak.  < Call me that again. >

Clark called him that again, and then again.  The words were a wall of light around them, holding back the darkness.

: : :

Eve Aries leaned back on her brocade couch as a trembling servant offered her a plate of exotic fruit.  She gazed off the veranda, through the wrought-ivory railings, across her city.  Her world.  The air was calm and still as evening fell.

The air was always still in Kandor.

To her right a dark-haired man sprawled across another couch, one hand firmly gripping the chain-draped ass of another servant.  Purplish bruises were rising along the girl's skin, but she knew better than to wince.  With his other hand he tipped back a goblet of wine and gestured for more.

Eve sighed as she considered her "son":  the dark hair curling just so on his forehead, the bright blue eyes full of life, the chiseled and aquiline features.  He was handsome, charming, powerful...the perfect Kryptonian.

He was a hollow sham.

Eve remembered, despite herself, how it had felt to fade out of existence--and then how it had felt to snap back into reality during the maelstrom of chaos caused during the recent struggles.  Her instinctive telepathic shield had protected her as Mekt and Laevar had been swept away in front of her horrified eyes before she had collected herself.  She had struggled against the riptide of reality with all her strength, worlds crumbling around her.  And then she had seen him, in a world about to dissolve like a soap bubble:  a replica of one of her sons.  She had saved him, pulled him here to a place she could recover.  And when he had awoken and his first act was to try and violate her, cursing and demanding to know where Owlman and Superwoman were, she had taken it upon herself to reshape his mind and personality to fit that of her son's more accurately.

She sighed again and lifted a grape to her mouth, then turned in a sudden flash of anger and slapped her servant hard across the face, all her frustration and boredom boiling to the surface.  "I told you I wanted these grapes _peeled,_ damn you."  The servant cowered and cringed as Eve gestured to the guards.  "A public flogging for this one.  I think twenty lashes should do to make the point."

Kal-El, Lord and Sovereign of Kandor, Last Son of Krypton and Savior of the City, grinned at his mother.  "That's just what I needed today;  thank you so much, Mother!"  He rose from his couch, tugging his servant with him.  "Let's go watch the flogging, sweet cheeks."  He left the room, dragging the bruised girl with him.

Eve looked out over her city.  How she missed her true son!  He was never crude or thoughtless;  he always treated his family with love and respect, ruling his land with implacable fairness, as unbending as light and as pure.  This "Kal-El" (how she hated the necessity of using the Kryptonian name!) was far too damaged and warped to ever be more than a veneer of sanity over the cesspool he truly was.  If she had been able to catch him at a younger age...

And there it was, the crux of her pain:  she had lost her masterwork, the pinnacle of her art as a telepath, her dear broken boy, Bruce Wayne.  Things would never be stable without him, the moon to Clark's sun, his quiet gravity moving Clark's heart.

She checked to make sure her false son was truly far away at the flogging, wincing away from the welter of thoughts going through his head at the spectacle.  Then she conjured up a Seeing. 

She had been checking on her sons, once every few weeks, ever since arriving back in the world.  Neither seemed to remember their time with her;  both seemed still irredeemably flawed by this world, soft and vacillating.  Most importantly, Clark didn't have his powers.  Nor did they seem to remember their true relationship;  they were almost always on opposite sides of the world during the year.  The one time she happened to see them together they had been sharing a meal at the Manor, surrounded by the odious, clinging pack Bruce dared to call his "family."  And there had been only friendship between them.  Still, she felt the need to check in on them now and then.

Her eyes narrowed as the image formed in front of her:  the two of them ringed by mountains, Bruce in Clark's arms, far above the ground.  As she watched, Clark leaned forward, laughing, to kiss his brother.

So.  They had their memories back.  And somehow she doubted they would go looking for their dear mother.  Their poor, loving mother who had sacrificed so much for them to bring them together and give them a world!

Saturn Queen dismissed the Seeing with an imperious wave of her hand.  It was intolerable, that she should rule here without her boys, with only this crass impostor who mocked her memories.  She would find a way to get her sons back, back in body and in soul, and then Kandor would learn the true meaning of majesty, of lordship.

A small smile curved her mouth.  They were such _naughty_ boys.  They were just lucky their mother loved them.

Loved them...so very much.


	2. Falling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Kandor, Saturn Queen makes a desperate gambit;  in Star City, Mayor Queen has three illustrious visitors;  and in the skies above upstate New York, Clark and Bruce go flying.

Saturn Queen checked to make sure the door was securely locked once again.  Then she triple-checked her fail-safes and examined her focusing device one more time.  The largest flawless diamond she could find in Kandor, it would be consumed in the process--and even that might not be enough.  If this went well, she would be incapacitated for days, maybe weeks.  If it didn't go well, or if her "son" interrupted her...well, it didn't bear thinking of.  She would have liked to wait a little longer, marshal her strength some more.  But the forces she needed to tap into were at their peak tonight and tonight only.

It had to be tonight.

She sat down cross-legged and gathered her thoughts, honing them.  It would have been easier with Mekt and Laevar here as well to anchor her--but she pushed those thoughts brutally away.  Her partners were lost to her.

With some luck and some sacrifice, her sons were not.

She felt the power coursing through her and bent it to her will, collecting and building it like a child rolling a hoop.  At its peak of strength she released it, an arrow into the heavens, a Call that could not be resisted.

Diamond dust strewing the floor around her, Eve Aries fell back into darkness and oblivion, knowing even as she fell that she had succeeded.  Smiling.

: : :

Oliver Queen, new mayor of Star City, signed yet another document.  His secretary handed him another and raised delicately plucked eyebrows at his sigh.  "If you're tired of the paperwork, sir, may I remind you that you still have guests waiting to meet with you?  Misters Wayne and Kent and Miss Prince?"

Ollie sighed again, gustily.  "They're really still there?  I've kept them waiting for thirty minutes now."

"Thirty minutes is not a long time to wait to meet the mayor, sir."

Ollie chuckled slightly.  "These are not people used to waiting, Alison."  He scribbled another signature.

"I think that's all your paperwork for today.  Shall I show them in now?"

Oliver Queen contemplated for a moment the delightful image of the Trinity sitting in civvies in his waiting room, killing time.  He flashed a smile at his secretary.

"Let's wait another thirty minutes.  See just how humble they're feeling today."

Thirty minutes later the three of them were ushered into the mayor's room, each of them looking not the least bit annoyed or impatient, of course.  Diana was looking like a modern Jackie Kennedy in a crisp white linen suit, her hair piled elegantly on top of her head and sunglasses tucked alongside.  Bruce was similarly stylish, his steel-blue suit neatly pressed.  Only Clark, as usual, spoiled the effect with his shirt half-untucked and his tie mis-knotted.  Ollie could never quite figure how Kent could bear looking like such a schlub.

Bruce started prowling the room the minute he entered, shaking out the drapes and eyeing the light fixtures.  "The room's not bugged, man, just how lax do you think I am?" Ollie said, ignoring the man's irritable snort.  He turned to Clark, who was watching the detective with a sort of tolerant amusement.  "A year off hasn't made him any less of a paranoid sonuvabitch, has it?"

"No, no it hasn't."  The Kryptonian's voice was warm, and Bruce Wayne snorted again, but halted his scouting after another moment of bookcase-examining.

Ollie sat down and propped his feet up on the desk, motioning for the others to sit.  "I assume this is about the JLA?  Well, you know, my duties as mayor now kind of--"

"--make it difficult for you to commit to the League.  We understand," Diana said smoothly.  "Actually, we were more here to get your impression on whether Connor or Roy would be a better choice."

Ollie blinked.  "Of course, of course," he said quickly, not missing the near-smiles on the face of the two men, damn their arrogant souls.  "Well, let's talk about the makeup of the rest of the team a bit, shall we?"

His three visitors outlined the probable lineup of the new JLA, including the places where decisions were still tentative, and Ollie nodded thoughtfully.  "Well, at least you haven't included that fascist, Hawkman," he muttered.  He considered both his sons carefully.  "I think it ought to be Roy," he concluded.

Bruce nodded in satisfaction, Clark looked a touch irked.  "And your reasons?"  Diana asked.

"For starters, he's got more team experience.  Plus, this team...interpersonally, he's very well-suited for it.  You've got Hal and Dinah on there--" He kept his voice level at the idea of a team with a Lantern, a bird, and an Arrow that wasn't him, "--And Roy knows and trusts them much better than Connor does.  They'll form a sort of secondary Trinity, another reliable group that knows how to work together and that you can fall back on."

Bruce grunted and Clark nodded reluctantly.  Diana, sitting between the two of them, simply smiled that cool and remote smile that always made Ollie feel...insignificant. 

And it was truly a measure of her divinity that Oliver Queen could never resent her for that in the slightest.

Alison showed the three of them out after another few minutes of polite discussion, and Ollie sat back down at his wide mahogany desk and fiddled with some paper clips, lining them up, linking and unlinking them.

It had been an interesting meeting.  Bruce clearly had a new girlfriend--and an energetic and obliging one at that.  If there was anything Ollie knew well, it was the look on the face of a man getting laid a lot more often than he felt he deserved:  half-smug, half-sheepish.  Diana, as usual, was impossible to read.  She had seemed her usual tranquil self, but Ollie sensed an underlying...uncertainty.  And Clark?  Ollie bent a paper clip out straight, then twisted it back to its original shape.  Losing his powers always seemed to affect Superman strongly.  Throw in the divorce and the recent ordeal he'd been through, and it was probably no wonder if he seemed more on edge than normal.  Happier than usual on the surface--which was odd, Ollie realized, because Clark was usually such a happy person.  But the top level of happiness had seemed truer and brighter than usual.  Still, under that--

The paper clip snapped in Oliver Queen's hands, and he tossed it aside.  It was getting late and if he wanted to get any sort of patrol in he had to get out of the office, not sit around dishing to himself about the Trinity.  He wasn't in the JLA, after all, and their problems weren't his.

Thank goodness.

: : :

Bruce Wayne was balanced on his hands on the ridgepole of Wayne Manor in a flood of moonlight.  He probably could practice his balance equally well down in the cave, but tonight he felt like being under the stars. 

He was forced to admit there was probably no real reason for wearing nothing but silk pajama bottoms while checking his balance as well. 

It was quiet and slightly cloudy;  the grounds below him were wreathed in pearly fog.  Somewhere a night bird chirped sleepily, but other than that all was still.  Bruce closed his eyes and centered himself, focusing on his own heartbeat, the minute currents of air around his body, poised and still at the pinnacle of the Manor.  


He felt the air around him shift slightly and opened his eyes to find his lover hovering in front of him, smiling.  As they were both upside-down, the red cape streaming up past Superman's head in the still air and the stars under both their feet were a bit disorienting for a second.  Bruce grunted and lifted onto one hand to reach out and tug the curl streaming temptingly away from the other man's forehead.

Superman slid through the air until his mouth closed against Bruce's, cool and demanding and pliant.  After a while the long-reversed posture began to make Bruce feel somewhat dizzy and a little giddy, so he dropped his legs down and pulled himself upright, shaking his head to clear it.  The Kryptonian uprighted himself as well and pulled Bruce back into their embrace, his hands and mouth trailing down Bruce's skin, tracing filagreed scars as if memorizing them, making small sounds of pleasure.

Bruce's double had been almost entirely free of scars.

Bruce continued to tell himself that the world was swimming around him because of the effects of gravity, but when a supple tongue flicked over a nipple he closed his eyes to shut out the wheeling stars above him.  _Kal._ He almost laughed when he realized he had begun to call his lover by his Kryptonian name, the name unsullied by that other world.  Denied his Kryptonian heritage by his false parents, it had been as Clark and as Superman that he had enslaved a world. 

Kal's mastery, he thought rather disjointedly, lay in more personal areas.

Kal's mouth eventually came back up to his, and Bruce realized abruptly that the Kryptonian's hands on his hips were now supporting as well as holding.  His eyes snapped open to find himself drifting gently above the Manor in Superman's arms, the misty gardens far below them.

He made a startled sound that was part protest and part something entirely else, feeling the blood start to hammer through his body demandingly.  They hadn't taken to the air together since the rescue two weeks ago.  "I don't think--"

Superman pulled him close.  "There are places, even near here, away from surveillance.  Fly with me, Bruce.  Let's fly.  Please."

"It's not the privacy I'm worried about."  In Kal's arms, gravity meant nothing.  Nothing could hold you down anymore.  Free.  He felt dizzy again and knew that Kal could hear his heart pounding.  He could hear it himself.  "This was _theirs_."  The sky all around you.  Nothing to bind you but desire.  Despite his cautious words he was up against his lover, one leg wrapped around his hips, pulling and grinding deliciously, silk against spandex, hardness against hardness. 

"We'll make it ours too.  Say yes.  Say yes and we'll go flying and christen the skies of this world together."  Kal's face was perfect in the moonlight, his eyes luminous.  He lifted upward briefly, a sudden burst of energy and motion, and the laws of physics bowed before him and granted Bruce a respite, free from gravity, free from care for just one terrifying moment.

Joy was dangerous, he reminded himself.

And heard himself say "Yes."

Kal smiled a little wistfully at what he saw in Bruce's face.  "Don't worry, _mithen,_ " he whispered.  "I know you'll never let us fall."

 **: : :**

The air over northern New York was cool, crisp and pine-scented.  Superman's suit and Bruce's pajamas hung on the top branch of a tall pine, the two of them far above.  Kal was laughing, for no reason Bruce could discern beyond happiness.  The Kryptonian was floating on his back, Bruce sprawled across him, trying to cover as much perfect flesh with his own as possible, his tongue exploring Kal's collarbones, the pearly skin stretched across them, the delicate little hollow at the base of the throat.  He nipped at the skin, so soft and so totally impervious, and Kal's laugh broke off into a panting moan.

"Needed this," Kal said breathlessly.  He flipped abruptly over onto his stomach, leaving Bruce dangling from his arms below him, his legs looped around Kal's hips.  Gravity pulled lightly at Bruce, but not enough to be uncomfortable;  for a moment he just lay there, feeling Kal's arms hold him like steel bands, completely reliable, completely safe.  Part of him didn't want to trust Superman so much.

Another part of him told the first part to go to hell.

Kal smiled merrily.  "Uh oh, I forgot the lubricant in my costume," he said with exaggerated chagrin.

It was an old running joke between the two of them on...the other side.  Bruce briefly considered reminding Kal not to conflate the two, but he couldn't bear to crush the mischief in those turquoise eyes right now.  "You'll have to go get it, I guess."

Kal nodded with comic resolve.  Then he dropped the two of them into free fall, plummeting out of the sky until they came to a perfect stop just above the tree with their clothing on it.

"Nice," Bruce said dryly, "But the stop at the end could have been a little more gentle."

I'm out of practice," Kal said wryly.  Then his face clouded over.  "Sorry," he muttered, apparently realizing he had fallen into patterns from the abandoned life.  


Bruce touched his face, the flawless angles of the cheekbones and brow.  "It's all right.  You haven't flown for the last year, after all," he said, ignoring the true apology. 

Kal turned to rummage through his uniform, coming up with a gel capsule.  He pushed off from the tree, drifting them upward into the sky again, the vast forest dwindling below them, his eyes and hands on Bruce, tender and sure.

They tumbled together through the air like eagles, and Bruce lost himself in the motion of their bodies, the sweep of the air around them.  Lovemaking in the clouds was a fluid and acrobatic act, positions changing from one to the next like a dance, never at rest.  Earth and sky revolved, dark green and deep azure, around them, caresses like wind between them.  Penetration was nearly an afterthought to their exhilarating, ecstatic flight, but at some point Bruce found himself buried deep in his lover's body, Kal's back curved like a rapturous harp string beneath him, then beside, above, in a dizzying spiral of abandonment.  Kal's cried out wordlessly as he climaxed, high and sharp, his voice more like a bird than a human.

More like an angel than a bird, Bruce thought helplessly, watching Kal's face surrounded by wind-tossed dark curls, transported by ecstasy.  He shuddered at the idea, denying, but his own climax seized him uncontrollably at the thought, tearing through him like a river of light.

Kal held him safe among the stars as he lost himself, and as he found himself again.

After, they coasted in silence for a moment, Bruce draped across Kal again as if on a bed of air, one foot dangling carelessly.  "I know," Kal said softly before Bruce could say anything, "You have to get back.  I do too."  He smiled lazily.  "I'll get the chance to wake up with you some morning, I swear I will."

Bruce opened his mouth to respond. 

With no transition at all, the forest was gone, replaced by a sprawling city of delicate towers far below them, the starry sky turned to a flat, glowering crimson-streaked gray.  "What the hell--" he snapped.

"Bruce." Kal's voice was shocked, flat.  Bruce looked at him;  his brilliant eyes were huge with alarm.  "Bruce, I can't--I can't--"

Gravity reasserted its power over them, dragging them down as if with iron claws.  Bruce felt the perfect body beneath him hang for a moment, like a thrown object at its apogee, then begin to drop.  He heard Kal's horrified intake of breath

They fell together from the sky like stars.


	3. Landing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clark and Bruce fall into Kandor and find both enemies and shelter.

Clark and Bruce were falling.

The alien city sprawled below Bruce's vision as Clark struggled to keep himself between Bruce and the ground.  He couldn't fly;  if he couldn't fly, he wasn't invulnerable, and the impact could--it was their best chance, and Bruce took the anguish that went through him and put it away somewhere else, carefully, focusing on their survival.

The deafening wind of their descent made Clark's hair stream past his face, obscuring it from Bruce's view at times, but he could see Clark's eyes, fixed on his.  Bruce knew what Clark was thinking, why he wouldn't look away, but Batman couldn't afford to be so romantic;  he looked past those steady blue eyes to try and guide their fall somehow.

All that flashed by in a couple of frozen seconds.  They thudded to earth in a park, green grass denting into sod from the impact, the breath knocked from Bruce's body like a hammer-blow from a god.  He rolled on the ground retching for breath, his lungs aching, and finally dragged in a huge gasp, his vision dim with shock.  He crawled on his hands and knees to get closer to the still body next to him.  Kal was--Kal was--

Kal was lying motionless on his back, his body driven into the ground nearly a foot by the strength of their impact.  His eyes were closed and he wasn't moving.  Wasn't breathing.  Bruce pounded his chest with his clasped hands, feeling the flesh give before his blows like any normal person's--let him have retained some invulnerability, he can't have died to save me, he can't--Clark drew in a ragged, weak breath and coughed, wincing, traces of blood flecking his lips.  "Bruce?"  he whispered.  "You okay?"

Bruce put his hands flat on the ground next to Clark so he didn't have to find out if they were shaking or not.  "Just got the wind knocked out of me.  You found enough flight in you to break the fall?"

Blue eyes opened just a crack, glinting.  "Just enough to fall...a little slower.  Think I...knocked the last bit of invulnerability...out of me there."

Bruce ran his hands over Clark's chest.  "I think you've broken a few ribs."

"I concur...with your expert judgment."

Bruce hated the way Clark always decided to get funny when he was hurt.  "At least you haven't broken your back or punctured a lung, or you wouldn't be cracking wise."  He stared at Clark.  "We're stark naked in...this is Kandor, isn't it?  I recognize the Kryptonian architecture, and the light is red."  Clark moved his head in a slight, painful nod.  "We're stark naked in a park in Kandor, what do you suggest as our next move?"

The slightest twitch of a smile.  "I think clothes...are first priority."

Bruce stood up.  "I'll be right back.  Don't move."  Something close to a chuckle, breaking off into a wheeze, was his answer.

Bruce slipped through the park into an alleyway.  The lowering dark crimson light provided enough shadows that he could make his way undetected through the alien streets.  The city was oddly silent and empty;  he saw no beings on the street and the houses were quiet and dark.  Bruce knew cities, knew how to read their souls. 

This was a city pierced through with fear.

Eventually he found what he needed--a clothesline with garments hanging from it.  The first one he pulled off the line had four armholes and he put it back, frustrated, but eventually he found a couple of tunics and pants in some kind of coarse beige cloth.  He put one on, rolling up the sleeves until they hung right, and slipped back to the park with the other set. 

Clark was lying exactly where he had been before, and Bruce felt a pang of alarm until he realized Clark's eyes were open and staring up at the sky, alert.

"Let's get you into some clothes," he said softly, supporting Clark as he sat up very slowly.  Clark's back was a mass of cuts and bruises from the rocks and sticks he had fallen on, but there seemed to be no serious punctures.  He slipped the tunic over Clark's head as gently as possible, then got him into the pants as well.  One of Clark's ankles was already badly swollen, and he flinched when Bruce touched it.  "This is probably broken too," Bruce muttered.  "You're going to have to lean on me."

Another of those annoying glints of a smile through the pain.  "Always do."

They limped out of the park together, Clark leaning heavily on Bruce, arm around his shoulder.  "I set up an apartment...after my last time here," Clark muttered.  "Only came a couple of times, but...it's near here.  Lucky...break."

They stopped to let Clark catch his breath.  "We're sucked into Kandor for reasons unknown, unarmed and helpless, you're badly hurt, and you think we've gotten a lucky break?  That's my Clark, ever the optimist," Bruce grumbled.

A breath of laughter as Clark pushed himself off from the wall and stumbled forward again.  "Your...Clark," he said softly.  "I'll never...get used to that."

Bruce glanced over at Clark's drawn face.  "Well, you'd better," he said gruffly.

Clark frowned as they made their way through the streets.  "Too quiet.  Something's wrong."

The silence was shattered a moment later as an amplified voice, speaking Kryptonian, echoed through the neighborhood.  "Hear me, citizens of Kandor, and witness justice in action!"  It was near them;  they automatically began to make their way toward it.  Very soon Bruce could make out another sound:  a woman's hysterical sobbing.

"Only the True Children of Kandor are allowed on the streets after Lightdown!"  The resonant voice continued.  "All others must stay indoors to reflect on their spiritual state and pray for salvation!"

Bruce and Clark rounded a corner and found themselves at the edge of a large public square.  In the center were four men in suits of ornate black armor dotted with glowing panels, hovering off the ground.  In front of the four men, a young woman knelt, tears running down her face.  Her skin was a mottled blueish green and delicate feathered antenna sprang from her head.

"This heretic was found violating the curfew!"  The leader pointed one gleaming, plated arm at the woman, who covered her face with her hands.  "The penalty is delivered here and and now, for the edification of all heretics."

He lifted his hand.  Bruce and Clark both leaped forward simultaneously, but Clark fell back with a gasping groan at the sudden movement.  The hand came down while Bruce was still only halfway across the square.  The woman's head rolled in the dusty ground, her eyes still open.  They were large, faceted like gems, and still glittering with tears.

The man's voice boomed out again.  "Behold the glorious justice of Kal-El, Lord of Kandor!  Let there be peace in His holy name.  Let all obey His merciful laws."  He caught sight of Bruce, standing in the middle of the square, and strode up to him, ignoring crumpled body.  The glowing visor was lifted to reveal a handsome face framed by curling chestnut hair.  "True Child, what are you doing here?" asked the man pleasantly.

Bruce forced his clenched hands to relax, forced himself to smile at the murderer and the other four police.  "I live near here...sir."  He nearly choked on the title, but men like this always liked to be deferred to.  There was silence behind Bruce.  He prayed Clark wouldn't do anything rash.

The man threw back his head and laughed.  "You live in the Alien Quarter?  Well, I guess there's no accounting for tastes.  I suppose that would explain your slight accent."  He looked grave for a moment.  "Be careful, True Child.  We all understand wanting to bring the True Word of Kal-El to the heretics, but over-exposure to their ways can be...corrupting."  He bowed slightly.  "A good evening to you, citizen."  He sketched a symbol in the air between them: a stylized "S."  "And may the glory of Lord Kal-El walk with you."  Bruce silently traced the same symbol in response, not knowing the proper words to reply with, bowing his head and biting back on the hatred boiling inside him.  The suited Kryptonians lifted off the ground and soared away into the sky, leaving the square reverberating with silence behind them.

Bruce turned back to find Clark huddled in the shadows at the edge of the square where he had fallen, half-conscious, his face gray.  Bruce helped him to his feet again;  he seemed to be almost dazed, the breath hissing between his teeth in agonized gasps.  Slowly the pair made their way to Kal's apartment. 

The key was hidden under the doormat, of course;  Clark's idea of high security.  Amazingly, the apartment hadn't been broken into.  The door swung open to reveal a sparse, nearly unfurnished one-room apartment.  The kitchen was in a tiny nook;  the bed little more than a mattress. 

Bruce eased Clark onto the bed and gently removed the tunic, damp now with blood.  He found a cloth and soaked it with steaming water, then busied himself with washing Clark's wounded back, cleansing the cuts of gravel and dirt.  Clark said nothing;  he had said nothing since the execution in the square.  His face was haggard and drawn, and he dragged nearly-sobbing breaths through his teeth as Bruce cleaned his wounds.  Bruce wrapped the swollen ankle in strips of cloth--tomorrow he'd try to find something that would work as a splint.  "The ribs I can't do anything about, particularly," he said to Clark.  "You'll just have to rest and heal while I try to find out how we got here and what's going on." 

Clark said nothing, his eyes fixed on something only he could see, dry and hollow.  Bruce shook his head.  "There was nothing we could have done anyway," he said, hearing his voice catch awkwardly between brusque and tender.  "We would have just been killed as well."

"I can't afford to get killed," Clark said abruptly.  "I can't get killed.  I have to find out who's doing this.  Who's doing this in my name.  I have to stop them."  His voice was taut with ice-cold fury and loathing.

"Of course we do," said Bruce.  Clark stared at him.  "But we both need to get some sleep.  Tomorrow I'll collect some information.  Rest now."  He brushed back the hair from Clark's forehead.  Without thinking, he leaned forward and kissed Clark's brow;  he immediately felt silly, but some of the wild fixedness went out of Clark's face.

He didn't want to jostle Clark's ribs, so Bruce laid down on the floor next to the mattress.  He knew Clark wouldn't be able to sleep well through the pain and made a mental note to try and find some medicine for that tomorrow, somehow.  Splints, pain medicine, find out what was going on here, figure out how to fix it and get home...it would be a busy day.  He fell asleep while developing theories on who could have brought them here and why.

He woke up with ruby sunlight streaming into the room.  Clark was at the edge of the mattress, looking over at him.  The Kryptonian looked tired and wan, but he was smiling just a little.  He reached out gingerly and brushed a finger along the curve of Bruce's jaw.

"Finally got to see the morning sun on your face," he said softly.


	4. Reconnoitering

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day after falling into Kandor, Clark rests, Bruce makes connections, and "Kal-El" has a bad morning.

Kal-El, Last Son of Krypton, Lord and Supreme Ruler of Kandor, woke up slowly, stretching to his full length in his ornately carved four-poster bed.  He frowned to find himself alone.  "Tommy?" he called querulously.  "Tommy, where are you?"

Tommy padded into the bedroom, Kal-El's silk bathrobe draped over his arm.  His name wasn't really Tommy, of course, it was some silly Kryptonian name.  But Kal called every boy that shared his bed "Tommy."  Just like he called every girl who shared his bed "Lois."  Her wasn't sure why.  It just made him feel better, somehow.

Sometimes he made Tommy and Lois fuck each other in front of him while he watched, and that was even better.

Sometimes he killed them when they were done, with heat vision or cold breath or his shaking bare hands.  And that made him feel best of all.

For a little while, at least.

Tommy held the light bathrobe up for him to shrug into.  He patted the boy on top of his dark head and wandered out to the veranda to meet Mother for breakfast.  he leaned on the rail as he waited for her, looking out over his beautiful city, filled with his beautiful people.  He knew, because Mother told him so, that he had been a bad man, a small man, before she found him and made him king of the world.  When he had nightmares about that other world, late at night, Mother would come and hold his head in her cool, cool hands and make them go away again.

Mother had given him all this.  All he had to do was be a good son and a good king in return.  Rule his people.  Keep them good and pure.  Like him.

Kal-El frowned.  Mother was late, which was not like her at all.  He felt a twinge of worry and grabbed a servant's arm.  "Check on the Queen Mother.  Tell her I'm waiting for her."  He paced on the veranda, chewing thoughtfully on a piece of bread.  Something felt...off.  When the servant returned, trembling with terror, to tell him that Saturn Queen's door was locked and warded, he felt no surprise, only a fear that he hid from the cowering servants as he flew through the vast marble halls to his mother's room.

"Mother?" he called, tapping on the filigreed doors of horn.  "Mother dear, please open the door."  No answer.  Behind him, the palace staff had started to gather.  Kal-El felt an uncomfortable feeling squirm through his gut.  He knocked on the door again, then pounded, then finally started to throw himself against it with all his strength.

The wards were strong, but Kal-El was stronger;  he burst through into his mother's room.  She was lying on the floor, her red hair spread around her like a fan, sparkling dust thrown in strange patterns around her.  "Mother!" he cried, and rushed to gather her up.

She was so light in his arms, so light and pale...as he held her, she smiled faintly and murmured, "Kal-El..."

"I'm right here, mother!  Here with you!"  But Saturn Queen didn't respond, lapsing back into unconsciousness.

Kal-El stared wildly at the servants crowding around the door.  "Someone find a doctor!  Someone--please--"  His voice cracked, and the Kryptonians fell back at the look in his eyes.  He didn't care, he hardly noticed them, hardly noticed when an elderly woman finally appeared to fuss over the Queen Mother, to take her pulse and check her breath and declare her healthy, but in a deep coma.  Kal-El placed his mother on her bed and huddled next to it, holding her hand.  His head was beginning to hurt.

He needed his mother so much.

: : :

Bruce rummaged through the closet in Kal's tiny Kandorian apartment, shoving hangers aside.  "Don't you have anything in black?" he asked Clark irritably.

"I'm sorry, Bruce.  When I set up this apartment I didn't particularly expect to have you as a house guest."  Clark was lying on the mattress on the floor that served as a bed, watching Bruce through half-closed eyes.

Bruce sighed and pulled out something in silver-gray with a great many pleats.  "How often did you come here?" he asked as he pulled on the alien garments.

"I only made it back a couple of times.  Then there was the Crisis, and I couldn't come back for the last year because I couldn't get to the Fortress."  Clark's voice was grim.  "I failed them again."

"Don't," said Bruce.  "Don't start with the wallowing.  We're going to fix this place and get the bastards dirtying your name.  That's all you can focus on now."  He stood in front of Clark and peered over his own shoulder critically.  "I don't know...do you think this makes my butt look big?"

Clark laughed and broke off into a wince.  "Ow.  Don't make me laugh, the ribs hurt like hell."

Bruce blinked solemnly back.  "You are aware, of course, that you're one of the only people to ever tell me to be less funny."

Clark quirked an eyebrow at him.  "It is a little difficult to comprehend."  Another wince.  "You've got the money?"

Bruce nodded.  It wasn't much, but Clark had assured him that it would be enough to get some medicine and food.  "And the address."

"One more thing," Clark said.  "You're going to need a Kryptonian name."

"You're sure I'll be able to pass as a Kryptonian?"

"You speak the language well enough, and humans look identical to Kryptonians--you said the guard yesterday thought you were a Kryptonian."

Bruce looked at himself in a cloudy, somewhat warped mirror in the corner.  "He called me a True Child."

Clark growled something inaudible.  "Anyway, a name.  'Bruce Wayne' isn't going to cut it.  'We' is an acceptable last name--" He pronounced it like the beginning of "Wayne"-- "and 'Bru' or 'Brus' might work."

"Brus-We?  I guess that'll do."  Bruce looked over at Clark.  "And you?  'Clark Kent' is hardly Kryptonian, and it doesn't look like you're going to be able to use your true name."

"'Klar' is a common name.  'Klar-Ken' is pretty close."

"Brus and Klar.  Together again for the first time," Bruce muttered sardonically.  "We do seem determined to gather as many appellations for ourselves as possible, don't we?"  He headed to the door. 

Clark's voice paused him with his hand on the knob.  "Be careful, Bruce.  We don't know what we're dealing with."

"I'll be careful, Clark.  Just lying low, collecting intelligence, making connections.  Don't worry."

The door closed behind him.  Clark shifted on the bed, grunting at the splinters of pain in his chest.  "What the hell else have I got to do right now?" he muttered to himself.

: : :

The light inside Kandor was always odd to someone from a planet with a sun.  Diffused across the pearly-gray sky, it was sullen and red, flat and rather foreboding at all times.  As he made his way through the busy street, Bruce reminded himself:  I'm in a bottle right now.  A bottle in the Fortress of Solitude.  I'm only a few microns tall.  It boggled the mind.

What were the odds anyone would think to look for them here?  Superman and Batman had disappeared without a trace;  Kandor was not the first place anyone would go looking.  No, if they were going to get out of here it would have to be on their own.

He reached the square where the power-suited Kryptonians had murdered that woman last night.  Today it was bustling with life, small stalls hawking sweets and ornaments, throngs of aliens and the occasional Kryptonian wandering about and haggling.  It was as if the butchery in the darkness had never happened.

Yet even as he thought this, Bruce noticed that there was one spot in the square where no vendors hawked their wares, one place people skirted, bowing their head briefly.

The spot where the woman had died was left bare, unmarked and unadorned, but clearly noted by most of the passers-by.

So they weren't totally cowed yet, Bruce thought with satisfaction.

He stopped at a few stalls, examining the wares, keeping one ear on the conversations around him, reading the tone of the city.  By the end of an hour he had gathered that the imposter Kal-El had arrived in the city a little more than a year ago and had proclaimed himself the Savior and Ruler of Kandor.  He seemed to have the full range of Kryptonian powers--people spoke of his flight and his heat vision--despite the fact he shouldn't under the red light of Kandor.

Bruce also caught furtive whispers of a "Queen Mother," but they were few and hushed.  When people spoke of the Lord Kal-El, their voices were filled with fear and a strong undercurrent of loathing.

When they spoke of the Queen Mother, the overriding tone was dread.

Bruce eventually made his way through the square and out the other side, moving south past the park they had fallen into last night.  The buildings became more ramshackle here, leaning in on each other dizzily, the paint and plaster peeling off.

He knocked on a specific door.  No response.  He knocked again.  It opened just a crack.  "I need to speak to Basqat," said Bruce.

"Sez who?" growled a rasping voice, the speaker unseen behind the door.

"A mutual friend...from outside."

After a moment the door opened just enough to let him in.  He passed through into the dark--and found himself with a knife at his throat.  He spread his hands out.  "I just want to talk to Basqat."

The being holding the knife had a few too many eyes and a lot too many teeth, and glared at him silently.  "I'm a friend of Kal-El's," Bruce said.  "The real Kal-El." 

Half of the knife-holder's eyes opened wide, and the knife pressed slightly harder against Bruce's throat.  "Prove it," the alien muttered, his overabundance of teeth slurring his words slightly.

"If I were working for the imposter, this place would already be leveled," Bruce said coolly.  "But he told me to tell you that he would never so sully the memories of Gysla and Shire and Jigsaw, would never make a mockery of their sacrifice."

At the names of the three Kandorian aliens who had died helping Superman during his last visit, the alien with the knife made a sighing whuffling sound.

From another room Bruce heard a harsh voice:  "That sounds like him.  Yes."  A gray-skinned alien with large, dark eyes entered the room, staring at Bruce.  "You're telling me the current Lord and Savior of Kandor is not the Kal-El who fought with us?"

"Did he seem to be the sort who would set himself up as a tyrant in the world he had helped free?"

Basqat made a spitting sound.  "Who knows?"

"You should." 

The alien blinked at him, nictating membranes sweeping over his eyes.  Then he gestured, and the knife at Bruce's throat lowered.  Basqat turned and walked through the building, Bruce following after.  Eventually they emerged into a large garage filled with various kinds of motorbikes.  Basqat picked up a wrench and began to tinker on one of the bikes.  "Where has he been?  And why did he not come himself today?"

Bruce struggled with the reflexive tendency to lie, not to give too much away.  Kal had told him to be as honest with the rebel leader as possible.  "For the last year he has been powerless in the larger world, unable to come here.  And he is badly injured here, unable to move easily."  Discomfort wormed through him:  he had given away that Kal was nearly helpless.  Damn the man and his damn honesty, anyway.

"And who are you?"

"You may call me Brus-We."  The aliens glanced at each other, noting the evasion.  "I am also from the outside world.  I'm a...friend of Kal's, brought here by forces unknown."

Basqat made a huffing noise and tightened a gear.  "And what exactly do you want from us?"

"Can you help us access the hatch to the outside world?  The one you used last time?"

The alien crossed his arms and glared.  "Do you think we are idiots?  When the imposter came, we tried to send someone outside for help, even if it meant their death.  All the exits have been destroyed."

Bruce felt a slight smile touch his mouth despite the grim news.  "So.  You assumed he was an imposter immediately."

Basqat's eyes narrowed, and then suddenly his face split in a toothy grin.  "I wanted to believe.  I am glad it may be so, Brus-We."

"He'll come here himself as soon as he can to speak with you."

Suspicion again.  "Make it soon."  He kick-started the bike, frowning at the sound it made.

"It's running a little rich," Bruce noted, and the rebel leader swung his heavy gray head to eye him again.

"You know bikes?"

Bruce bit down the desire to respond glibly that he knew everything.  "I know bikes," he said simply instead.

Basqat handed him the wrench.  "Prove it."

A half-hour later the bike was running better and Basqat was looking very pleased.  "Come back tomorrow and we might find some more work for you."

Bruce wiped grease off his hands with a rag.  "How about those?"  He pointed to a corner of the garage, where two police power suits stood, propped against each other.

Basqat snarled.  "We stole those from the Praisesingers, but have been unable to modify them for use with non-Kryptonians." 

Bruce frowned.  "You don't have a single Kryptonian on your side?"

The toothy alien had remained silent until now, but at this he erupted into something that sounded like mangled swearing.  "Who of the True Children would possibly stand with us," he gnashed out as the curses eventually resolved into words.  "They all side with Kal-El and his Bitch-Mother."

Bruce found himself nose-to-snout with the alien.  "You don't ever call that pretender Kal-El.  He's not Kal-El.  Kal-El would never let this happen."  He took a deep breath.  "And there are always members of the dominant population who oppose the regime in situations like this.  Always."

The alien continued to sputter something about "stinking True Children," but Basqat raised his hand, saying simply, "Harrn.  Peace."  The other alien fell silent and Basqat looked at Bruce for a long moment.  "We have never been able to create connections within the Kryptonian community.  But perhaps that can change now."

Bruce knew there was a savage smile on his face.  "Perhaps it can."  he nodded toward the power suits.  "And you give Kal and I those suits and we can make a difference on the streets as well."

Basqat sighed.  "One step at a time, Brus-We.  Let me meet this person you claim is truly Kal-El.  Let us all start to talk strategy.  And we shall see."

Bruce knew when he had pushed as far as he could;  he hadn't really even expected to have Basqat trust him this much.  He nodded.

As he started to leave, Basqat spoke again.  "You'll need money."  Bruce paused, looking back.  "Work on the bikes for us and I'll give you a little.  Not much, but enough to get by." 

Bruce ignored Harrn's unhappy growling and nodded.  "I'll get Kal here as soon as I can."  He slipped out the door and back out into the streets.

: : :

Clark heard the key turn in the door and tried to get back to bed in time, but was unable to move fast enough.  Bruce stood in the door, two paper bags in his arms, glaring at him.  "What are you doing in the kitchen?"

"Just thought I'd check on the state of our larder."  Clark shrugged under Bruce's scowl, wincing.  "I couldn't stand to just lie there any more."  He gestured at the bags.  "What have you got?  And how did it go?"

Bruce pulled a bottle filled with orange powder out of the bag.  "First things first.  This is a pain-killer and sedative."  He poured a glass of water and dissolved some of the powder in it.  "Drink up."

Clark grimaced.  "I don't want to be drugged."

"Tough luck, hero.  You need to heal."  Bruce held out the cup implacably, and eventually Clark took it and drank.  "Let's get you back into bed," Bruce said as Clark pulled a face at the taste, and carefully got the Kryptonian back to the mattress. 

"There are two of them," Bruce said as he pulled a blanket over Clark.  "The man calling himself Kal-El and his mother."

Clark's eyes were bright and interested as he mulled this over.  "Theories?  Who has the power to drag us in here and the motivation?  Brainiac always is a possibility with Kandor.  Maybe the 'Kal-El' is actually a robot."

"Who's the woman, then?"

Clark shrugged slightly and winced again.  "Brainiac can take on a lot of forms."

"Could it be that woman, the one who pulled you in here last time?  She made a whole imaginary life for you, pretended to--"  Bruce broke off.

"--Pretended to be my wife?  Lyla?"  Clark sighed.  "She did it once, she could probably do it again, although I haven't seen a trace of her since Basqat and his gang helped me defeat her."  He yawned abruptly, then shook his head to clear it.  "Did you find Basqat?"

Bruce watched the clear blue eyes slowly filming over, the mouth softening, losing the lines of pain.  "I found him and he seemed to trust me.  He's given me a job helping out with the mechanic work."  He reached out and put a hand alongside Clark's face.  "But he wants to see you as soon as he can."

Clark leaned into Bruce's touch, his head heavy against his lover's hand, his breath growing more even.  "I'll try," he whispered drowsily, before slipping into sleep.

Bruce lowered Clark gently into a fully reclining position on the mattress.  Clark didn't stir at the movement, lost in drugged sleep.  Tentatively, then more surely, Bruce brushed his hands through thick black hair, with a tenderness he might never have shown if there were any chance Clark would wake to it.  He leaned down and pressed a kiss into the dark waves.  "You always do," he said softly.


	5. Planning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A week after arriving in Kandor, Clark visits Basqat for the first time and tries to win the trust of the aliens of the Resistance. He also runs into evidence of Bruce's "P.R. progam" to win them popularity around their neighborhood.

"It's been a week, Bruce, I'm healed enough to hobble down the street to Basqat's."  Clark Kent shrugged gingerly into a black leather biker's jacket with red trim, trying not to wince too obviously.  Bruce Wayne eyed him narrowly, then handed him a pair of round, wire-rimmed glasses.  Clark perched them on his nose and peered at his lover.  "What do you think?"

Bruce walked around him slowly, examining him from top to bottom, perhaps spending more time on the black-clad posterior than was strictly necessary.  "I'd say you definitely qualify as a KILF."

Clark started to ask, then broke off into a blush.  "I meant do you think people are going to recognize me as Kal-El?"

Bruce shrugged.  "Considering most people seem to think the bozo in the palace is the real Kal-El, and as it's clear he isn't the sort of person to wander around the alien quarter, I don't think it would even cross most people's minds."

"Good."  Clark grabbed a pair of boots and started to bend to put them on, then stopped short with a gasp.  "Okay, that might have been overdoing it."

"Sit down."  Clark lowered himself onto one of the stools they were using as kitchen chairs.  "Let me," said Bruce, taking the boot and kneeling down in front of Clark to slip it on and tie the lacings.  He looked up at Clark, smiling slightly.  "My liege lord of Kandor."

"Don't even joke about that," Clark said, looking pained.  "I'm getting damn tired of versions of myself ruling worlds."

Bruce slid the other boot on, taking time to caress Clark's calves and shift upward just enough to make Clark's eyes close slightly.  "I'll call you whatever I want to in the privacy of our own home."  He looked up to see the grin on Clark's face.  "What?"

"Our own home."

Bruce looked around the shoddy little apartment.  "It's not much of a home."

"I don't care."

Bruce focused on finishing up the laces of Clark's boot.  "There.  Ready to go."

They made their way slowly through the alien quarter, Clark limping slightly on his injured ankle.  After a while Bruce put one arm under Clark's shoulder's, supporting him, and they went together through the crowded, dirty streets.

They went through the large square again, set up with the stalls and wagons of the marketplace, busy and bustling.  Bruce stopped at a few of the stalls to make conversation, checking the wares and joking easily with the vendors, picking up the gossip of the day.  He halted in front of a booth with the counters piled high with fruit, picking up a large semi-apple.  The vendor popped up from behind the mound of fruit:  something like a very large spider in a flowered shawl.  "Brus!" it--she--exclaimed.  Half of her eyes rotated to take in Clark, who smiled at her.  "And this must be your ilyon you've told me so much about!"  She used the Kryptonian word for "beloved," "life-partner," "soul-mate," and Clark shot a look at Bruce.

"He called me his ilyon?"

The arachnid alien chittered anxiously.  "Are you not?  Brus, is this not the Klar you've been talking about?"

Bruce's arm around Clark tightened slightly and Clark hastened to reassure her.  "No, no, that's me, it's just--I didn't know he, uh, called me that."

"Oh, Rao," the alien clattered cheerfully, sorting through the piles of fruit with her lower legs and waving her upper legs for emphasis.  "Every day Brus tells me how his Klar is healing after that nasty fall you took, how well or poorly you slept, how much he's looking forward to the wedding--"

Clark was too surprised to say anything at that.  He just nodded rather numbly.

"We can't even really start planning the wedding until those ribs of yours heal up though, can we, Klar?" Bruce said cheerfully.  He leaned over and nuzzled Clark on the cheek and Clark felt himself turn scarlet.

The vendor made a happy skreeling noise.  "Oh my, he's blushing, the dear."  She reached out with one bristly claw to chuck him under the chin, then handed him a small lime-like fruit with another arm.  "Here, sweetie.  This one's on the house, for the adorable couple."  She poked Clark's nose very lightly, making his eyes cross.  "Brus is so smitten with you--he's a real keeper!"

They walked away through the streets.  After a moment in which Clark said nothing at all, Bruce said, "We'll attract much less suspicion if we're a pair of idealistic lovebirds, slumming in the alien quarter for romantic thrills.  Plus--if we're stuck here for a while, which we might well be--we're going to need friends and allies in the area, and romantic couples are charming.  It's smart public relations."  He sounded just a bit embarrassed.

"Public relations," Clark repeated.  "So...you're not actually 'smitten' with me."

Bruce made an energetic snorting sound.  "Bruce Wayne has never been 'smitten' in his life, much less Batman."

"And Brus-We?"

Bruce stopped dead in the middle of the street and turned to Clark, grasping the edges of his leather jacket lightly.  "Brus-We...is deliriously in love with the most wonderful being in any world, and wants the whole universe to know it."  He leaned forward and put his lips to Clark's, his arms going around him, deepening the kiss well past affectionate into passionate, his tongue demanding and teasing.

Bruce was kissing him. In the middle of a crowded city street.  The bystanders moved around them, some stopping to stare;  from somewhere an appreciative wolf-whistle sounded.

Clark just held on and enjoyed himself.

Bruce broke away eventually, eyes glittering almost violet in the red light.  "Does my fiance approve?" he asked, his voice hovering somewhere between husky and teasing.

Clark rested his hands on Bruce's shoulders.  "I almost suspect you're enjoying this."

Bruce grinned slyly.  "Batman doesn't enjoy things."  He turned before Clark could respond and began to move again.  "Better not keep Basqat waiting just because I was making out with my ilyon in the streets."

Clark made his way after him, still limping a little, but smiling.

Behind them, out of earshot, the fruit vendor was chatting enthusiastically with another customer.  "Pure K he is, and he didn't mind my touching him at all!  Smiled at me, he did, friendly-like.  Maybe there are some good True Children after all..."

: : :

The bolt slammed back and the door swung open to reveal Harrn, who gnashed his multitude of teeth angrily at the sight of Clark.  "Peace," said Basqat to the other alien, eyeing Clark from head to toe.  Clark said nothing, slipping the glasses off his nose and into a jacket pocket, waiting.  After a moment, Basqat said, "What color were the baubles Gysla liked to wear in her hair?"

Clark smiled faintly.  "They were golden, like her hair and her riding jumpsuit.  Her brother made them for her before he died."  His eyes met Basqat's squarely.  Her last words to you were, 'For a second there, you even had me believing--'"

Basqat bowed his head. 

"He could be a telepath," blustered Harrn.  "He could be pulling that all out of your mind." 

Basqat nodded thoughtfully.  "He could be.  I don't think so, but I swear, Harrn, I'll be cautious."  Harrn subsided, growling.  The rebel turned back to Kal and Bruce.  "Come with me."

They walked into a cavernous garage to find a small crowd of aliens waiting there.  Bruce read the body language of the group, which did not bode well for them.  He assessed the threat:  about forty angry aliens against him and a powerless Superman.  Clark could brawl as well as the next guy--but not a whole lot better. 

Next to him, Clark drew in a short breath.  Bruce followed his gaze to a glimpse of feathery green antenna and a slender green-skinned woman who could have been a twin of the woman murdered in the square the week before.

Basqat addressed the group:  "Doubtless you have heard Harrn and I mention that a man claiming to the be the true Kal-El has arrived in Kandor along with his companion.  Here is that man.  He claims to be willing to help us fight against Kal--against the man who calls himself Kal-El, and bring equality to Kandor.  What do you say?  Shall we trust him?"

Bruce felt Clark stand up a little straighter under the scrutiny of the crowd.  "Can't trust them," muttered someone in the group, and the others stirred restively, a ripple of agreement going through them.  "They're Pure K!"  another voice said, "True Children!  They've never given a damn about what happens here, to any of us!"

"I care--" Clark started to say, just as the green butterfly-girl darted up out of the crowd.  She dashed up to him and spat full in his face.  "Your companion says you were there!  You were there when my podsister was killed!  And you didn't stop them!  You let her die!"

"That's not fair--" Bruce began angrily, but fell silent.  Martial artists sometimes speak of a chi--an aura of energy that great martial artists can summon.  Beside him now, he could feel Clark's chi rise up like great invisible wings.  He saw it in the crowd's eyes.  Not a fighting chi.  Something different--something unique to Clark.  To Kal.

Watching awe move across the crowd like light on water, Bruce wondered not for the first time how aware his lover was of his own power.  Not the heat vision, not the flying.  The true power.

Kal made no motion to wipe the spittle from his face.  "What was your podsister's name?" he asked quietly.

The green-skinned alien fell back a step, her antenna twitching.  "Kisharnathalinwyrrwyranna."

Kal nodded.  "Kisharnathalinwyrrwyranna.  I'll remember.  I'll remember that I failed her, as you said.  I'll always remember it.  And as long as I draw breath, I will fight to bring down the people who killed her."

"Because they've sullied your holy name?" The woman's voice aimed for mocking and didn't quite get there.

"No.  Because it's wrong, and unjust.  Because those who abuse power must be countered, no matter what name they use to justify their obscenities.  Because Brus and I have fought all our lives against cruelty and evil and always will, wherever we encounter it.  Always." 

The green-skinned alien's hands were clasped in front of her mouth, her faceted eyes wide.  "It is you, the True Lord of Kandor..." she began.  Kal stepped forward and went to one knee in front of her, taking her clasped hands in his.

"Never.  Only Kal-El."

"Only--"  The woman's voice broke off into a shaky laugh.  "Ah," she said, "Only Kal-El."  One long antenna reached out to brush the traces of her spit from Kal's face.  "My podsister..." she said hesitantly.  "Her friends called her Kish."

Clark pulled himself up to his feet again, wincing slightly.  "And what's your name?"

"Risharnashalinthyrrythyranna."  A hint of a smile.  "But you may call me Rish."

: : :

"Rish joined us the day after her podsister was murdered."  Basqat was lounging against a wall, watching Bruce and Clark examining one of the two police suits.  Bruce had the chest open and was poking at the circuitry;  Clark was turning the helmet over in his hands.  "More people join us all the time...but we lose many as well."  The rebel leader's voice was low.

"Not a single Kryptonian has given you aid?"  Clark asked.

Basqat grunted.  "We've never found one we can trust."

Bruce didn't look up from his work.  "That's going to have to change.  The alien population isn't large enough to make a difference against power of this sort.  Unless we can get out of here and bring in help, you're going to have to find connections in the Kryptonian community."

"They'd never help.  They have no incentive to."

Bruce snorted.  "Believe it or not, Basqat--and I don't often find it easy to believe myself--there are always people who will fight injustice when they have no reason to, beyond it being the right thing to do.  We just have to find them.  First, we have to start making it clear that the Praisesingers don't operate with impunity here.  What's the name of the guy who was leading the squad that killed Kish?"

"Chestnut hair, scar on his chin?"

"That's the one."

"That's Cray-Gil.  High-ranking Praisesinger.  His squad is made up of his brother Mor-Gil, Unna Ra-Linn, and Vor-Mun."

"Do you know where they all live?"

"Of course, but it makes little difference when we can't move without detection outside of the Alien Quarter."

Clark tossed the helmet lightly in the air and caught it again.  "Maybe you can't, but Brus and I can."  He shared a look with Bruce.  "I suspect Brus is planning guerrilla and psychological warfare even as we speak."

Bruce loosened a bolt carefully.  "It might be helpful if bad things started to happen to that squad.  Just enough to leave the impression that there's dissent in the Kryptonian community.  If it seems there's an underground movement of opposing Kryptonians, people might start looking to join it."

"But there isn't one," Basqat pointed out.

Bruce tapped the bolt.  "There will be."

Clark was holding the helmet out in front of him, like Hamlet with Yorick's skull, considering.  "I think some alterations may be in order."

Bruce glanced over at him.  "Great minds think alike.  'Golden wings all gilt in glory / Son of the sun, a soul of passion'."  He was clearly quoting.

Clark's eyebrows shot upward.  "'Violet eyes alight with valor / Black his armor, burnished brightly.'  I didn't know you'd read the Saga, Brus."

The other man chuckled, somewhat wryly.  "Would you believe I took them with me during my travels last year?"  He looked at Clark and dropped his eyes back to the armor.  "I just wanted to brush up on my Kryptonian, that's all."

Basqat kicked a rivet across the garage floor.  "Would anyone like to explain what you two are talking about?"

Clark grinned at him.  "The Saga of Nightwing and Flamebird.  The mythical Kryptonian heroes."

Basqat's eyes narrowed.  "I've heard of them.  What of it?"

"The Saga ends with the heroes swearing to return from the Lands Beyond if ever injustice rules the land again."  Clark eyed the helmet with some satisfaction.  "I do believe it's time for them to make an appearance in Kandor."

"As soon as I finish the alterations and your ribs are healed, that is," Bruce corrected, wiping his hands on a rag and standing up.  "And there are still the wedding plans to be considered."

"Wedding plans?"  Basqat looked bemused;  Clark looked half-aghast and half...not.

Bruce just looked smug.

: : :

"You cut it into wedges and sprinkle it with a little sugar and it's ready to go," Clark said from his chair as Bruce started slicing the small green fruit the vendor had given him.  "It's actually supposed to be an aphrodisiac," he admitted.

Bruce sighed.  "Just what I don't need right now, what with my boyfriend being broken and all."

"I'm healing as fast as I can," Clark said rather huffily.

"You'd better be."  Bruce put a wedge of fruit in his mouth and made a face.  "That's bitter."

"That's why you need the sugar.  It starts off bitter but the flavor shifts to sweet later."

Bruce chewed gamely for a little bit and his face slowly changed expression to neutral and then surprised.  "Oh."  He swallowed and then licked his lips carefully to get all the juice off.  "I see.  That's...really good."

Clark snickered.  "There was a tree of these growing out back of our old house in the Upper Quarter.  I remember the neighbor kid swiped one during a picnic, even though we told him he was too young to appreciate it.  The face he made as he spat it back out!"  He laughed merrily, but then abruptly stopped, his face clouding.  "But that wasn't real, was it?"  He said softly as Bruce continued to cut the fruit.  "It never happened.  That's a memory Lyla put in my head when she dragged me here.  A fake life.  Another fake life."  His fists balled on his knees.  "None of it was real.  So much I remember...was never real."

Bruce put down the knife and crossed the room to Clark.  "This is real."  Clark's eyes were sad, and Bruce leaned forward and kissed him.  "This is real," he murmured again.

Bruce's mouth tasted like the fruit he had just eaten.  It was bitter. 

And then it was sweet.


	6. Assisting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clark's ribs still aren't healed, but he manages to improvise.

Bruce Wayne broke off the kiss and flopped backwards onto the bare and broken mattress he shared with Clark.  "No good."

Clark groaned.  "Come on, Bruce, I'm fine.  Really!"

Bruce shook his head.  "I saw you wince and try to hide it when you moved too fast there.  It's only been ten days since you came close to breaking every bone in your body, so don't try to tell me those ribs have healed enough for sex."

Clark sighed with exasperation and then flinched and touched his chest lightly.  "You're just not interested," he said sullenly without thinking, and immediately felt stupid.  Of all the petty, moronic things to say...

Bruce just looked at him.  Clark glanced away, then back.  Bruce was still just looking at him.  "Sorry," muttered Clark.  "I'm just...I'm pretty much stuck here until my ribs heal, there's some unknown quantity out there terrorizing the people of Kandor--my responsibility-- in my name, and I can't even heal enough to give my lover some pleasure.  Not to mention I'm pretty viciously horny myself, but I'm fairly certain even masturbation would hamper my ribs' healing, and I can't afford that.  I've got to hurry up and get out there and get something done!"  Frustration and tension coiled through his voice.  "I feel so useless."

Bruce slid with sinuous grace to recline alongside Clark, a hint of mischief sparking in his eyes.  "I could argue with you about that, since we've been working together on our armor redesign nonstop, but I'm not going to bother."  He slid one hand into his own silky pajama bottoms, slipping them down over one hip.  "However, I can think of something you can do to help in the sexual release area as well."

Clark was staring at the strong, sinewy hand resting on the muscled hip.  "Um...you can?"

The pajamas slid down further;  Bruce put his thumb and forefinger lightly around his cock, not-yet-erect, nestling in crisp, dark hair.  "You can talk me through this."

"I...um, I can?"  Clark felt his heart start to race at the sight of Bruce touching himself.  "I'm not...so good at that..."

Bruce chuckled throatily, his eyes drifting half-shut, his hand moving very slightly.  "That's one of the things I find incredibly hot about you, Clark:  the way you protest innocence so prettily while I know perfectly well you know what to say to me."  Clark watched hungrily as his lover's cock hardened and stiffened, flushing with arousal.  Bruce swallowed.  "I'm already half-crazy with wanting you, Clark.  Get me the rest of the way there."  His hand slowed, then stopped.  "Tell me what to do, Clark.  I won't do anything until you tell me to."  He was panting slightly. 

Clark groped for words, mesmerized by Bruce's flushed face, his straining erection.  "Move your--"  He stammered, caught his breath.  "--Move your hand, Bruce."  Silken skin slid under Bruce's grasp as he moved his fingers agonizingly slowly, up and down.  "That's it," Clark whispered.  "That's good.  Isn't that good?"

"Yes," Bruce said shortly, biting his lip.

"You're so beautiful," Clark said softly.  "Such a beautiful cock.  So hard..." Bruce made a small sound.  His eyes were tightly closed now.  "Go a little faster.  Just a little."

Bruce picked up the pace a fraction.  The crimson tip of his cock was weeping fluid, a few pearly drops.  "Rub your thumb across the top, Bruce.  Get yourself wet."

Bruce flicked his thumb across the glistening head, rubbing until the whole shaft was damp and shining.  Clark licked his lips even though he knew Bruce wasn't looking.  "God, I wish I could lick all that off."  Bruce's hand moved, sliding and caressing, giving himself pleasure because Clark had told him to.  Clark felt a rush of something like exhilaration, like drunkenness.  This wasn't so difficult.  He could do this.

"Clark," Bruce said hoarsely.  "So...so close."

"But you'll wait, won't you?"  Clark heard something close to a purr creep into his voice, a smugness like velvet.  He knew what Bruce liked.  Of course he did.  "You won't come until I tell you to."

"Waiting..."  Bruce's hand slowed to nearly a quiver, the muscles of his throat tense.  "I won't--God, Clark, please, let me--"

Clark knew better.  The longer he waited, the better it would be.  "Not yet.  I could watch you stroke yourself all day, Bruce.  Watch you bucking up against your hand like that, knowing you're thinking of my mouth and my ass and my cock, that you're waiting for me to let you come."  This was easy.  It was so good.  "You're going to come so hard for me, and you're going to say my name the whole time.  Aren't you?"

Bruce grunted, his face a rictus of pleasure and tension.  "Yes.  Yes."

Clark sat silently for a moment, watching Bruce straining against his own hand, struggling not to climax, seeing the pressure coiling up in his lover's body, unbearably tight.  "Ask me again," he whispered.

"Please let me come, Clark," Bruce gasped immediately.  "I can't--can't wait much longer--it's so--ah, please--"

"Bruce," Clark said simply, "Come now."

Bruce's whole body spasmed sharply, shaking with orgasm, soaking his hand and the sheets.  "Kal--Clark--Kal--" he groaned between gasps.  "Yes." 

It took him a long time to come back from the faraway place his climax had carried him, his eyes sleepy and shadowed, replete.  "That was good," he said simply.

"It was.  You are." 

Bruce yawned and rolled over to press gently against Clark, careful of the ribs.  "Just you wait...until you're healed up..." he murmured drowsily.  "...fuck the daylights out of you..."

Clark chuckled.  "Sounds good."  He lay for a long time after Bruce's breaths had become even, aroused but not unpleasantly so, savoring the quiet moment, remembering Bruce's voice adrift in abandon.

Maybe he wasn't entirely useless after all.

  



	7. Recruiting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clark sets out to win over one of the few Kryptonians living in the alien quarter.

Clark sighed and stretched out under the light of the sunlamp, letting it bathe his aching ribs.  It was weak and flickering against his closed eyelids, but it was yellow light and it felt like balm on his skin.  Traces of the painkiller were still in his system, making everything seem fuzzy and slightly faraway.

Even better than the light was the cool hand that flickered across his skin briefly, brushing across his slowly-healing wounds with practiced ease.  "How does that feel?" Bruce Wayne asked him.

"Nice.  Doesn't hurt."  The hand pressed gently, stopping when it saw pain on his face.  "Okay, that hurt a little."  Clark pried his eyes open to take in Bruce's calm, unworried face, abstracted with diagnosis.  Most people would have laughed if told that Batman had a good bedside manner--although Clark could think of a set of young people who already knew this as well.  He never fussed, but was never brusque or impatient either.  With his touch and demeanor he seemed to always be saying, with simple clarity:  you will heal.  I know you will.

Bruce moved to the tiny kitchen--really more a wall with an oven and refrigerator--and started cutting up some fruits and vegetables, including a few ilya, the bittersweet fruit he had come to enjoy.  "How was the day's work?"  asked Clark, watching his lover's sure hands on the cutting board.

"Chief Praisesinger Cray-gil's sewage system stopped up again last night, second time in a week.  And his lieutenant Mor-Gil's power suit was scribbled with graffiti."

Clark snickered.  "Graffiti?  What did it say?" 

"Oh, very rude," Bruce said lightly, carrying the plate over.  "Not for your tender ears.  Though certain parts of the suit might have been circled and labeled 'teenie weenie.'"

Clark started laughing and put a hand to his ribs reflexively, although the pain wasn't that bad now.  "Isn't that a bit juvenile?"

The look Bruce shot him over the platter of food was far from juvenile:  sardonic and knowing and rather wicked.  "According to Basqat, there is no organized Kryptonian movement against the pretender.  You can't just walk into that and rally the troops."  He chuckled slightly at the look on Clark's face.  "You could try, but I'm not even sure you could succeed starting cold with an intimidated population.  Right now the Praisesingers are feared and respected.  We have to start chipping away at that respect."  He glowered at the man lying on the mattress.  "Clark.  I know this will gall you, but we can't just go rushing in and fix everything immediately.  This kind of war takes a while to fight.  You're going to have to trust me."

Clark sighed and smiled ruefully.  "Of course I trust you.  There's no better strategist on the planet."

Bruce held up a wedge of ilya.  "Open up," he said teasingly, and slipped it into Clark's mouth.

Clark grumbled, "You keep feeding me that fruit.  I've told you it's an aphrodisiac, and you keep bringing it home.  I begin to suspect you're evil."  He reached out to grab a stick of something like carrot as Bruce smirked.

"It's not my fault.  Ch'k'rt"--he pronounced the arachnid fruit vendor's name without hesitation--"insists on giving me some for free almost every day.  She seems to find us charming."  He held out another piece of dripping fruit.  "You wouldn't want to disappoint Ch'k'rt, would you?"

Clark took the fruit from Bruce's fingers with his mouth, tasting wormwood that melted into succulence.  "Maybe it's only an aphrodisiac to Kryptonians," he muttered.  "It doesn't seem to bother you much."

"How little you know, my ilyon.  Why do you think I came up with this sun-lamp?  I can't stand to wait much longer to get you into bed."

Clark snorted.  "You know as well as I do that what you can't wait for is to get both of us into those power suits.  How are the alterations going, by the way?"

Bruce arranged sticks of vegetables into a pyramid.  "I think I've got the Flamebird's wings stabilized now, the balance seems to be right.  We're still cobbling together material for a shield.  Can't we get by without one?"

Clark shook his head.  "The original Flamebird had a shield with an archaic version of the S-mark on it.  For obvious reasons, that will be useful to have."

Bruce heaved an exaggerated sigh.  "As you wish, Lord Flamebird."  He cocked an eyebrow at Clark.  "Are you sure you're willing to be the 'sidekick'?"

"'Sidekick' isn't really the right term, you know.  Hey, which version of the Sagas did you read?"

"Um, the one by Minal-Zee."

"Oh, well.  In most other versions, you know, Nightwing and Flamebird aren't hero and sidekick."  Clark smiled.  "They're lovers."

"Oh."  A flash of wry smile.  "In that case, then, I have no further objections."  Bruce picked his mug off the floor and sipped thoughtfully at it.  "In a related matter, Clark..."  He paused and seemed to gather his thoughts.  "Basqat has told me the name of one Kryptonian who lives here in the alien quarter that he thinks might be trustworthy.  She has...not taken opportunities to abuse the aliens that she could."

"That isn't a whole lot to go on."

"It's all he's got.  Would you be willing to go and talk to her tomorrow, get a feel for her, maybe plant some seeds?"

Clark swiped the mug from him.  "Sure."

"There's one more thing you ought to know about her."  Bruce looked uncomfortable.  "You're not going to like it."

Clark listened to his explanation.  Then he shook his head, his mouth set.  "No.  No, no.  I'm not going there.  You do it."

Bruce grimaced.  "I'm sorry, Clark.  You're the right person for the job."  He looked at Clark's pained eyes and narrowed his own slightly.  "You said you'd trust me when it came to strategy."

Clark looked miserable.  "All right," he whispered.  "But I hate it."

Bruce very carefully put his arms around Clark.  "I know."

: : :

Clark stopped in front of the building, taking a deep breath.  Delicate spires of white and silver lifted in front of him, reaching toward the sullen red sky in adoration.

In front of the church was a statue of a man, impossibly handsome, staring down at his supplicants with a commanding look on his face.  The s-shield was on his chest.

He really didn't look that much like Clark. 

The inside of the church was lofty, airy, and empty:  silvery arches met over Clark's head, carved with the symbols of Rao and Yuda, god of the sun and goddess of the moon.  This had probably been a shrine to those gods before being converted to...its current purpose.  The stained-glass windows--showing scenes of Kal-El's great acts of redemption--cast lurid red and blue lights through the cool white-and-silver of the church.  Clark made his way slowly down the aisle, staring at the altar with its s-shield design.  Behind the altar, a woman in red and blue robes was arranging flowers.  Clark slid into the front pew and sat for a while, trying to center himself and get past the gnawing nausea the place gave him.

Eventually, the woman turned and saw him.  Surprise flickered across a fine-boned, elderly face, framed with long white hair.  "Oh, I didn't hear you come in, child.  I'm so sorry," she said.

"Forgive me, Mother," Clark said, using the polite form of address for Kryptonian priests and priestesses.  "I didn't want to interrupt you."

The woman laughed softly.  "Interrupt me from my important business of flower-arranging?  How terrible of you."  She moved to sit in the pew behind Clark, looking at him closely.  Clark held his breath, but no reverence or awe crossed her face, merely polite good humor.  "So, why are you visiting a church of the Holy Savior here in this Rao-forsaken part of town?"

"I live near here.  And...lately I've been feeling...unsure of myself.  Lost.  Confused.  Like it's all meaningless."

The priestess smiled.  "Well, let's begin with the basics."  She began to speak in a slightly singsong voice, as if reciting her catechism.  "My son, do you believe in the infinite and inherent goodness of Kal-El, He who Saves All?"

Clark closed his eyes.  Infinite and inherent goodness.  The sound of Lois's voice as she was finally forced to tell him that he no longer loved her.  Kon-El's grave marker.  The smell of Oliver Queen's flesh burning from his bones.  "No."

"And do you believe in His purity and glory, that He conquers death and--eh?"  She blinked at him as it slowly registered he had not answered the first question correctly.  "I beg your pardon?"

"I said no, I don't believe in Kal-El's 'infinite and inherent goodness,' or his 'purity' or his 'glory,' and if he ever conquered death it was due to no heroism on his part."  Her blank and astonished look merely filled him with more anger, and he heard his words as a bitter flail that scourged them both.  "This 'Kal-El' you've created stands for nothing, he's just your attempt to shift responsibility from yourself and wait for someone else to save you.  You can't count on him.  Purity, glory--he's nothing, he's empty."

The priestess rallied.  "My son, you have lost faith.  You have lost your way."  She reached out to touch his balled-up fist with a hand that shook slightly.  "You're wandering in darkness."

He shook his head viciously.  "I have faith.  I have faith in other people, that they won't let others suffer and wait for a magical being to save them.  That might seem like darkness to you, but--"  He stopped, caught his breath, "--but I have faith in the darkness, that it can hide within it mercy and has no need to trumpet it in the daylight.  Darkness doesn't need shining statues built to it.  I'd rather be lost in darkness forever that be in that light."

The look on her face brought him up short.  What was he doing?  He was supposed to be here trying to win her over, and instead he'd launched into a furious diatribe on the very foundations of her faith.  "I'm sorry, Mother," he said, and stood to leave, but her hand on his tightened.

"Are there others who feel as you do?" she asked very softly.  "Are you alone?"

"No, I'm not alone," he said.  Never alone in the darkness.  "I really am sorry, Mother."

She looked up at him.  Her eyes were a blue so pale as to be colorless.  "Please, call me Bine.  Bine Lor-Malu."  She took a deep breath.  "I've been praying for a sign."  A tremulous smile that made her face look younger.  "I never expected it to come in the form of an ordinary man."

Clark sat back down.

: : :

"I haven't mentioned the Resistance to her yet, but we had a long heart-to-heart about the way the aliens are treated, her bitter disappointment that the Kal-El who returned to Kandor shows no inclination to mercy, her hopes that she might be able to make a difference somehow.  I think we can count on Bine if we need a Kryptonian contact, especially one in the Church."  Clark was making dinner this time, trying very hard not to burn the meal.  "I don't understand it," he said bemusedly to Bruce, who was tinkering at the kitchen table on one of the suit's anti-gravity units.  "I got so angry at seeing myself worshiped that I totally lost my temper, said horrible things, and somehow that got through to her?  What were the odds of that?"

Bruce just looked at him, a small, smug smile on his face.  "I told you to trust me."

: : :

Kal-El, Ruler of Kandor, paced outside Saturn Queen's door.  It had been more than two weeks now, and Mother still showed no signs of waking up.  The doctors said her life wasn't in danger, she just...wasn't waking up.  Kal clenched his fists.  His head hurt.  His nightmares had become more and more frequent.  He wasn't meant to be alone, damn it!  He didn't understand a lot of things about himself, but he knew he wasn't supposed to be alone.

He heard footsteps coming up the long marble corridor and recognized the heartbeat.  Cray-Gil, one of his most trusted Praisesingers.  Kal understood Cray, understood how his mind worked, how he enjoyed keeping order and stability in the alien quarter, the rush of pleasure at putting your boot on peoples' necks and making them agree with you.  Usually talking to Cray made him feel better.  But today the Praisesinger's face was clouded with apprehension as he approached his sovereign.

"Approach Us, faithful Cray-Gil, and tender to Us your report."  He tried to use the formal Kryptonian, but without Mother around it was so difficult.  He talked differently without Mother around, and it always disappointed her so much, when he was crude or blunt.  He was trying to keep his behavior proper with her gone, so she'd be proud of him when she came back, but it was so hard.

"My Dear Lord."  Cray-Gil sank to one knee.  "It's a minor thing, my Lord, hardly worth mentioning, but...in the last week there have been a number of acts of petty vandalism against myself and my squad."  He detailed the small indignities.  "I usually wouldn't bother you, but they struck me as potential signs of insubordination among the Kryptonian population."

Kal felt his teeth grinding together.  "They should be honored to have Our trusted and beloved Praisesingers among them...the stupid sons of bitches!"  Cray-Gil looked up, surprised at the sudden coarse language, but Kal was transported by rage.  "You find who's doing this, Cray, and we'll make sure they get their arms ripped off.  Give me something to go on and I'll do it personally.  We can't put up with shit like this, I know, I remember.  It starts here and next thing you know everything's shot to hell and you have to start all over." 

He realized he was breathing a little too heavily and collected his thoughts.  Damn, but his head hurt.  He waved a hand regally at the kneeling Praisesinger.  "Go now, faithful servant.  You have pleased Us with your--your faithfulness and...your telling Us."  That didn't exactly roll off the tongue well, but Cray-Gil genuflected and left.

Kal rested his forehead against his mother's bedroom door, feeling the ivory cool and soothing on his heated brow.

Everything was falling apart.  It always fell apart when he was alone.


	8. Speaking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clark and Bruce do some last-minute adjustments to the Nightwing and Flamebird armor and prepare to take it for a test flight.

Kal-El was sitting at his mother's bedside.  This week's Tommy was rubbing his back, which had about as much actual benefit for steel-tense muscles as knocking feathers against it, but it felt good to have someone touching him.  People had started to avoid him, and he could see the fear in their eyes as he stalked down the corridors of his palace.  He didn't understand why that didn't cheer him up.  Usually he liked seeing fear in people's eyes.

Kal sighed and stroked his mother's lax hand, thinking hard.  Maybe it was because it wasn't the right kind of fear, the "holy shit that is one bad-ass motherfucker" kind of fear.  This was a different kind of fear.  Like they thought there was something wrong with him.

Thinking always made his head hurt.

A guard in a full power suit cleared her throat at the door.  "Your Majesty.  Forgive the interruption, but...there is something I think you should see."

Kal sighed and put his mother's hand gently back on the coverlet.  "Stay," he said to the dark-haired boy he was calling Tommy, and followed the guard.

He looked back to see if Tommy had disobeyed his order and stayed close to him, but of course he hadn't.  Tommy was a good boy, an obedient boy, and he always followed Kal's commands.  There was nothing in the boy's sweet azure eyes but fear and adoration.

The wrong damn eyes. 

Why didn't Tommy ever have the right eyes?

The guard lifted off into the air and headed to the palace entrance.  As always, the awe on her face as Kal soared without the benefit of a suit soothed his soul somewhat. 

At least until they reached the arching main gates and he saw the graffiti scrawled across them in red paint:  "Coward king and pale pretender!"

Kal felt a muscle tick at the corner of one eye.  "Have you caught them?"

The guard tensed.  "No, sir."

Kal stared at the challenge.  "What does it mean?"

The guard's eyes were wide with surprise.  "My Lord.  You've...never read the _Sagas_?"

Kal sighed to himself.  Mother would have kept him from revealing his ignorance of something that was obviously so important.

Now he was going to have to kill the guard quickly.  What a waste.

 **: : :**

Clark Kent sang to himself as he pulled a shirt over his head, the Kryptonian harmonics strange and atonal to his Earth-trained ears, yet somehow soothing.  _"Bin-Alor the vain and boastful / Looked upon the land he lorded / Lor Shah Mal, the shining city / Humbled now beneath his heel."_

Strong hands tugged the shirt down from behind him, smoothing it across his chest.  It was an awfully tight shirt, but Bruce seemed to like it.  _"On the gates of gold he saw them,"_ Bruce Wayne sang rather off-key, continuing the verse, _"Words of righteousness and rage: / 'Coward king and pale pretender, / Face us, fight us, craven foe!'"_

Clark turned to smile at his lover.  "Good choice of stanza to reference for our opening shot, I think.  No one saw you?"

Bruce scowled.  "You wound me by even asking."  He tapped experimentally on Clark's ribs.  Clark arched an eyebrow at him.  "Just checking."

"Do I pass?"

The tap became something caught between a diagnostic check and a caress as Bruce watched Clark's face carefully.  "You seem ready enough.  I hope we can avoid direct conflict with the Praisesingers, though.  I want this to be a flight test, not a fight test."  Something moved behind Clark's bright blue eyes and Bruce frowned.  "I mean it, Clark.  I know the situation makes you mad as hell, and I don't blame you.  But I want to make sure the suits work correctly at a basic level before risking a battle with them."  He scooped Clark's glasses up from the nightstand.  "If we go now, we'll have enough time to do the final adjustments before night falls.  Ready to give them a run-through?"

Clark plucked the glasses from Bruce's hand and perched them on his nose.  "Let's go."

 **: : :**

They hadn't counted on there being a street festival of some sort going on as they went through the public square on the way.  Candies were being handed out by alien children with ribbons in their hair or wound around their ears or horns or antennae.  Raucous music was coming from an enthusiastic gang that resembled an alien mariachi band.  Bruce stopped to accept a handful of candy from a little girl who looked like a cross between an antelope and a Cuisinart, handing some on to Clark.  "Look, Klar, they're selling Slivian charms," Bruce said, tugging him over to a stall and stopping to turn a a glass ornament over in his hands.

"This one is for luck in love, fair gentleman," said the blue-skinned vendor.

"Oh, I don't need that," said Bruce easily, handing it back and grinning at Clark.  "Have you got one for general success in endeavors?"

The vendor held up an ornament, a flattened oval about the size of a small coin.  Midnight-blue and scarlet threads ran through it, glimmering.  "I'll take it," said Bruce, handing over the appropriate amount of money and slipping it into his pocket.  He caught Clark's expression.  "What is it?"

Clark pitched his voice under the hubbub of the crowd surging around them as they turned away from the stall.  "It's just...not like you to allow anything to distract you from work."

The dark blue eyes were maybe just a little wistful.  "You don't like it?"

"That's not it at all," Clark said hastily.  "It just...doesn't seem like you."

"But it is me," Bruce explained, flinging his arms out to encompass the busy street.  "Brus-We loves this kind of stuff, he enjoys music and candy and good-luck charms, and he loves spending time with his fiance like this."

"You're not Brus-We."

Bruce pulled him backward into the path of a parade of dancers going by, trailing an array of red ribbons and streamers.  A laughing alien looped scarlet ribbons around the two lovers, pulling them together.  All around them couples were being lightly bound by red streamers, kissing and laughing. 

Bruce put his arms around Clark, put his lips to his ear.  "I'm not?"  A warm tongue flickered into Clark's ear, and he caught his breath, pulling away to look Bruce in the face.  

"Brus-We isn't real," Clark said.  "He's just...a happy version of Matches Malone.  A facade you use to get the job done."  Bruce's smile didn't change, but Clark suddenly felt badly somehow.  "I love you.  You don't need to...pretend all this for me."

Bruce pulled on the streamers to tug Clark closer and kissed him almost fiercely.  "It's not for you," he said against Clark's mouth.

"For the mission, then."

Bruce stepped away, untangling the streamers around them.  "The mission.  Of course."  The look he gave Clark was unreadable, but his mouth was wry as he took Clark's hand and wove through the traffic, heading toward the garage where the power suits were kept and back to work.

 **: : :**

Clark caught his breath at the sight of the two suits standing against the wall.  He and Bruce had been working on them for a couple of weeks now, but they never failed to impress him. 

Both were basically suits of medieval armor, but streamlined and sleek, composed of parabolic lines as elegant and undulating as an Art Nouveau painting.

The Nightwing suit was of gleaming violet-black metal with silver accents;  the Flamebird armor was gold with scarlet touches.  Both of them had wings springing from their backs, slender metal blades spreading like feathers.  They weren't necessary to fly, of course, but Bruce had modified them so they could be used as secondary weapons in close combat.  He had been very proud of that addition.

Right now they stood lifeless, but Clark knew that once he and Bruce stepped into them and lowered the visors the eyes in the helmets would blaze to life, dripping violet and crimson light. 

He sighed with satisfaction and felt Bruce radiate smugness beside him. 

Bruce stepped forward to run his hand gently down the black armor.  "I hope Dick won't mind that I'm using his name," he murmured.

Clark grinned.  "Leave it to you to find something to feel guilty about with such masterpieces.  Trust me, Dick would be proud to loan his name to these beauties.  And Kandor needs her heroes."

Bruce reached out to brush his hand lightly across the golden armor next to it, skimming across the gleaming chest, and Clark felt an odd thrill, as if it were his skin under those fingers.  "Let me watch the process of suiting up first," he said just a touch breathlessly, and Bruce smiled and turned back to the Nightwing suit, touching it gently.

The suit slid open with a nearly silent purr of metal on metal, and Bruce stepped into it.  It whispered shut around him, metal closing over his limbs, leaving only his face uncovered.  He stepped forward, reaching down to remove a small rod from the waistline.  With a snap the rod expanded into a glowing double-bladed staff of black light:  a replica of Moonbeam, Nightwing's legendary weapon, given to him by the goddess of the moons.  He took a dramatic stance.  "How do I look?"

" _His beauty bright shone through the darkness_ ," Clark said appreciatively.  "You look perfect."

"You're just saying that because it's true," Bruce said lightly, but his eyes shone.  "And check out this final modification.  I've been saving it for a surprise--and, well, because I wasn't sure if it would work," he amended.  "I'm still not sure, but let's give it a go."  He touched a hand to his temple and the visor swing shut, obscuring his face entirely.  "It's amazing what's possible with the super-super-miniaturized technology we have here.  I was hoping to reference stanza 185, when the pair comes back after the Trials of the Gods.  Does it..." he paused and the helmet tilted to one side, eyeing Clark.  "...does it work?"

The words came to Clark only dimly, the meaning lost entirely in a flood of irresistible reaction.  The voice from behind the visor was utterly compelling, filled with command and power.  Clark felt awe and reverence rise up in him, undeniable.  He wanted to fall to his knees, wanted to kneel before the puissance of it, the glory...he felt himself swaying and heard the voice saying his name, but he didn't know how to answer it.  What response would ever be good enough for that voice?  Then a metallic hand was shaking him and it was just Bruce's voice again, his face worried and the helm open. "Clark?  Are you okay?"

Clark took a long, shaky breath.  "I think you should...probably tone that down a few notches."

"So it works?"  Bruce sounded pleased.  "The subsonic amplifier is intended to evoke a feeling of authority and respect."

Clark sat down a little harder than he had planned to on a bench nearby.  "Tone it down a bit, Bruce.  Respect is great, but we don't want to encourage people to worship us."

"Worship?"  A thoughtful pause.  "The effects might be a little stronger than I intended."  Bruce grinned at Clark, a boy with a nifty new toy.  "It's a shame it won't work outside of Kandor;  the microelectronics will only work at the nanolevel."

Clark contemplated the vision of Batman swooping out of the sky using _that voice_ , and thanked all the deities he had ever heard of or met that it only worked in Kandor. 

Bruce stepped out of the suit, black metal unfolding like silk around his body.  He pulled a tiny crystal out of the visor, put a jeweler's glass to his eye, and tapped at it gently, minute glints of light sparking from it.  "Suit up and start getting used to it, we'll take them out soon," Bruce said over his shoulder.

Clark stepped into the suit and it closed shut around him, pressing his limbs firmly but not uncomfortably in a metallic embrace, his face still exposed.  He flexed his hand and felt the faintest whir of machinery as his armored fingers opened and closed.  The response lag was almost undetectable.  He shrugged a shoulder and felt the bladed wings stir to life with a liquid clashing noise.  Below the wings rested Flamebird's scarlet shield, and at his hip he could feel the hilt of Sunray, the holy sword Flamebird had received from Rao.  He pulled it from the belt and activated it;  golden light flared up in the form of a saber.

Clark extinguished the sword after a few test swings and tapped his temple;  the golden visor swung closed.  He could see through it but he knew it was opaque from the outside.  "I suppose you probably rigged the sonic doohicky so it only affects Kryptonians and not humans," he said. 

Bruce almost dropped the crystal he was working on and swung to stare at Clark in the armor.  "What?"  Clark said, somewhat annoyed.  "Don't get pissy at me for pointing out that you're a canny bastard, Bruce, it's part of what--"  He stopped abruptly as he realized that Bruce's pupils were dilated almost to solid black and the look on his face wasn't irritation, not at all.  Clark snapped the visor open.  "Sorry?"  he said rather weakly, remembering almost unwillingly the effect the enhancer had had on him.

Bruce took a deep breath, getting his expression back under control.  Then he stalked over to Clark and deftly extracted the crystal from Clark's visor as well.  "I'll just be taking this down a notch or two," he said evenly.  His back to Clark again as he worked, he cleared his throat.  "I've built buffers into our armor's sensors, so it wouldn't have affected us while suited up anyway.  But your point is taken."  He put the altered crystals back in the visors, not meeting Clark's eyes. 

As Bruce cleaned up the work bench, he reached into a drawer and pulled out an identical little crystal, holding it to the light.  "I wonder if I could rig up a portable version of that visor, to take home for more...personal uses," he mused out loud.

Clark had to laugh at the speculation in his lover's voice.  "Oh no you don't, Bruce.  I'm not letting you use one of those on me in bed, you can just forget about it."  His knees felt rather weak at the idea, actually, but he wasn't going to mention that to Bruce.

Bruce shrugged, put the crystal away, and went to step into the Nightwing armor.   Shining black metal closed around him, leaving only his face uncovered.  He cast Clark an opaque look. 

"Who says _I'd_ be the one using it?"

He touched his temple and the helm swung shut before Clark could decide if the expression was mocking or not. 

The Nightwing armor stepped forward with liquid grace and bowed politely to Clark.  _"Faithful friend and fairest comrade / Let us now begin the battle."_

 __Clark grinned and shut his visor as well.  "Let's," he said briefly, satisfaction in his voice.

  



	9. Launching

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clark and Bruce take a test-flight of the new power suits and do a little motorcycle racing.

Two figures slipped through the shadows of the abandoned streets of Kandor.  To be more accurate, one--the black form--slipped through the shadows.  The golden-armored knight tried to, but had a distressing tendency to _glitter._

 __"Can't you be a bit more stealthy?" hissed Bruce over the commlink.

"Flamebird doesn't do stealth," Clark said a bit haughtily.  "Flamebird raises hearts and hope wheresoe'er he goes.  He does not _sneak."_

 __Fortunately, no Praisesinger patrols came by.  And if any aliens happened to see two avatars from Kryptonian legend slip by their house, they decided to keep quiet about it.

Eventually the pair came to the edge of the city.  Between them and the gray glass wall at the edge of their world stretched the wasteland of processing plants and generators that kept the city running.  "Ready?" Bruce asked.

"I've been ready for almost three weeks now," Clark said tightly, then bent his knees and launched himself into the air.

Bruce caught his breath for just a moment as the Flamebird armor took flight, the dull red light of Kandor's sky gleaming from golden skin, bronzed wings flaring against the flat sky.  Proprietary pride filled him--whether at the armor he had created or the man inside it he wasn't sure. 

Clark made a graceful loop through the air, then hovered.  "It's...well, it's not the same as flying under my own power," he said, and Bruce could hear the baffled yearning in his voice.  "But it isn't bad."  A golden arm extended.  "Join me?"

Bruce lifted off gently, feeling the machinery whirring almost silently around him, all the gyros and gears that made this possible.  He rose to where Flamebird was and took the outstretched hand.  Complicated sensors let him feel, slightly, the pressure of Clark's hand on his.

They soared together, and Bruce knew a moment's guilty joy that Kandor made him Clark's equal in the air.

At the flat gray wall they stopped.  Opaque and sheer it rose before them, forbidding.  Bruce rested his hands on it, staring at the unyielding surface.  The glass was one-way:  people in the Fortress could see in, but the inhabitants of Kandor couldn't see out, to spare them the sight of giants bending over their home.  Unless someone happened to be looking at this precise spot in the bottle right now...Bruce hit the wall gently with a frustrated fist and it absorbed the sound completely.

"You say nothing will leave a mark in this stuff?"

"Nothing we've got in here right now.  Not even my heat vision.  If I had any.  And it's frictionless--nothing will stick."

Bruce made a mental note to get working on something that could help leave a message on the wall.  A sudden, unexpected wave of homesickness caught at him:  his world, right on the other side of that glass.  So far away.  He rested his armored forehead on it and sighed.

A weight on his shoulder--Clark's hand.  Flamebird's wing wrapped around Bruce's shoulder like a cloak, metal brushing metal.  "We'll get home, Bruce," Clark's voice whispered in his ear, over the commlink, intimate and warm.

"I know," said Bruce softly.

They checked the emergency exit and communications consoles next and found it was as Basqat had said--they were all slag now, destroyed by something. 

It looked like heat vision.

Neither of them said anything, but Bruce knew that Clark's mind was going over the same thing his was:  who was this impostor who apparently looked passably like Kal-El, who seemed to have his powers?  And who was the mysterious "Queen Mother"?  There were too many possibilities, too many theories, and Bruce _really_ didn't like some of them.

Bruce hated when he couldn't narrow his options down.  He needed more information.

The light was beginning to brighten into day as they descended from the sky to the hideout on the very edge of town where they could, with luck, come and go undetected.  Basqat was waiting for them there with a few of his group.  He eyed them as they landed, satisfaction and suspicion warring in his gaze.

Bruce was careful to snap open the awe-enhancing visor before speaking to the rebels.  "They work well.  Thank you for all your help putting them together."

Basqat nodded carefully.  "When will you be ready to put them to real use?"

"We'll patrol the streets tomorrow night and stop any abuses we see occurring."  Behind Basqat, Bruce saw Rish's sharp silver teeth bared in happy ferocity, incongruous in her pretty moss-green face.

Beside him, Clark stepped from the gleaming Flamebird armor and spoke to the rebel leader.  "I was hoping you'd give me something else to do during the days as well.  I'm tired of feeling useless."  His voice was mild, but Bruce could hear the bitterness, the frustration, running deep under it.

Basqat smiled.  "We need a courier for our cover business.  One that we can trust to sometimes deliver...less innocuous messages as well."  The smile sharpened.  "Do you have any interest in riding a motorbike for us?"

Clark's face lit up like the sunrises Kandor never saw.

 **: : :**

"Think you can keep up?"  Clark was laughing as Bruce strapped his helmet on, and Bruce didn't even deign to answer.  The Kryptonian ran his hands across the bike with the same affectionate touch he had given his Flamebird armor.  Basqat had loaned them two of his best.  "You don't need to come along, you know."

"I have to fix any bikes you happen to wreck, you know.  It's better if I experience how they run as well," said Bruce gruffly.  He didn't mention that he just wanted another excuse to be with Clark, feel the speed blending them together, like flying, like sex.  He started up his bike with a roar and took his seat. 

He was still adjusting to the feel of the bike when Clark released the brake and leaped out onto the road.  Bruce hastened to catch up, overtaking him just as the road turned into one of the vast arterial highways.  The two of them wove through traffic at a breakneck pace, their feet sometimes almost brushing as they veered between other vehicles.  Landmarks and signposts whipped past;  surprised faces in windows flickering past them.  Clark skidded to a stop at their destination just a few seconds before Bruce, pulling off his helmet to grin with delight, his dark hair plastered to his forehead in unruly curls.  "Beat you," he said cheerfully, then darted into the building with the package.

Bruce waited for him, still straddling the bike, feeling it purr under him.  It was a nice area of town;  small Kryptonian children ran along the sidewalk with their parents.  In the window of a sweet shop across the street, a lightcatcher turned lazily in the faint breeze from traffic.  It was made up of stained-glass crests of the House of El.  Bruce watched the shining crests revolve slowly.

Clark came back out of the building empty-handed, swinging one leg over his bike with easy grace and sliding his helmet over his head.  "First one home gets a blow-job?"

Bruce revved his bike.  "Better start limbering up your lips," he said.

Clark was out of the driveway before Bruce started to move.

 **: : :**

"Wait," gasped Clark, on his back on their shared mattress.    His black leather pants were yanked down to his knees, and he hadn't had a chance to take his jacket off.  He shoved sweat-damp hair out of his eyes.  "Wait," he said again.

Between his legs, Bruce looked up from the inner thigh he was nibbling.  "Your ribs okay?"

"Yeah.  They're fine."  Clark just stared at him.

"Then what?" 

"You've never done this to me before.  In the--in the real world.  I've done it to you once, but I've never gotten..." His voice trailed off and he looked at Bruce's face, breathing heavily.  "I guess I just wanted to savor the moment a bit more."

Bruce darted his tongue out and traced a delicate line across hot, silky skin, enjoying Clark's choking moan.  "I'm the one savoring," he purred, and Clark inhaled shakily.

"I remember," he said, almost dreamily, "I remember you're so good at this."  He closed his eyes, nearly wincing.  "You've never done it to me before.  I remember how good it is."

His face was pale, and Bruce couldn't stand to watch him struggling anymore.  "Let's make those match up, Kal," he said softly, and moved forward.

Clark gasped sharply, the gasp turning into a groan of satisfaction.  The sound he always made at that moment, the sound Bruce had never heard him make before, that he knew as well as his own voice.

Bruce closed his eyes against vertigo and concentrated on making both of them live in the precise moment, the now they were making made real together.


	10. Clashing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On their first patrol, Nightwing and Flamebird clash with the Praisesingers.

"...need to get a good look at the bastard."  Clark's mutter carried clearly across the commlink, and Bruce glanced over at his partner in the shining Flamebird armor. 

"I know, Clark.  We'll get him out of the palace eventually."  The two of them were doing their first patrol of Kandor, hovering above the streets of the Alien Quarter and waiting for a sign of Praisesingers.

"Could he be Ch'p?"  Clark's voice was rather lorn.

"Ch'p is _dead_ , Clark.  He was also a hero, and more to the point, he was a _squirrel._   He didn't look anything _like_ you."

"He was a Green Lantern!  He could have gotten resurrected, gone evil, and be using the ring to...look like me.  Somehow."

Bruce sighed.  "All right, Clark, I'll add an evil resurrected squirrel Green Lantern to the list.  Which already includes a rogue Daxamite, Hank Henshaw, Ultraman, General Zod, or some random guy dressed up like you with the tech to duplicate your skills.  It could be a robot built by Professors Morrow or Ivo, or Brainiac.  It could be a White Martian, Clayface, Circe, Ares or any of the other Greek gods.  It could be Dr. Destiny, Dominus, Spellbinder, or one of the illusionist crowd.  Then there's the possibility that it's one of the mind-controllers who've gotten their hands on a friendy shapeshifter, like Psimon, Queen Bee, Grodd, Starro--"  Clark muttered something under his breath at the mention of the mind-controlling space starfish, "--or I suppose it could be Mr. Mxyptlk on the rampage again.  And that's not even taking into consideration the possibility of time-travel.  Or it could be, God forbid, _someone new we've never encountered yet."_ Bruce took a deep breath.  "We've been over all of this, Clark.  And we still won't have the answers until we can--"

"--can lure him and his Queen out into the open, I know," Clark said heavily.  Bruce couldn't tell from his tone if he had considered the one possibility they hadn't discussed.  He probably had, of course.  But Clark hadn't processed all those memories yet, he was still struggling with flashbacks and slips into that other personality, and Bruce didn't want to risk exacerbating the problem.  "The rebels said he looked almost exactly the same as me," Clark said hesitatingly, and Bruce cursed to himself.

"They've never gotten a really good look at him.  And 'almost exactly' and 'exactly' aren't the same.  They don't know you like I do."  It shouldn't be possible to _feel_ Clark's smile over the commlink, Bruce thought absently.  He continued lightly, "The odds are it's just some random Kandorian with delusions of grandeur and good tech." 

Clark's sigh gusted through his speakers.  "I hope you're right."

An hour or so later, Clark perched next to Bruce on top of the Church of Kal-El, looking out over the Alien Quarter.  The rest of Kandor blazed in the night, but this section of town was dim and silent under curfew.  Clark scanned the city, trying to put his fears and doubts about the imposter to the back of his mind, to focus on the present moment.

A movement.  Four power-suited Praisesingers floated through the sky above the alien sector.  "No," whispered Bruce's voice in his ear even though he hadn't moved yet.  "We can't confront them until they threaten someone.  We have to be saving lives, not just fighting for supremacy."

Clark forced himself to remain still, hidden in the shadow of the church's spire.  The Praisesingers were still far off, but he could see the S-symbol emblazoned on their gleaming chests.  His fingers itched to smash against them.  "They've killed so many.  They killed Kish."

"We're not here for vengeance.  We're here for justice."  The sound of Batman lecturing Superman about not focusing on vengeance would have made Clark laugh if he hadn't been so intent on watching Cray-Gil and the others, feeling the machinery around him yearning for flight, for battle.

"Oh, no," Bruce whispered harshly at the same instant Clark saw it:  a tiny green figure in the streets below them, moving boldly through the silent city.  "It's Rish.  She's trying to provoke them.  Damn the girl!"

The Praisesingers had spotted the butterfly-girl at the same time they had;  they swooped from the sky to hover near her.  From the leader's armor came a voice:  "Hear me, citizens of Kandor, and witness justice in action!"  The same voice Clark had heard the night they had landed in Kandor.  The same words he had heard before Rish's sister's head had rolled in the dust before him as he staggered, helpless. 

Helpless.

Instead of cringing or weeping, Rish threw back her head and screamed defiance:  "Lord Flamebird!  Save me!  I beg you!"

Clark was in the air before the echoes of the scream could fade away, barreling down on the lead Praisesinger and swinging his shield like a weapon, smashing it into the side of his enemy's head.  He soared upward away from the dazed Praisesinger, activating his sword.  _"You shall not touch her!"_ he thundered, and saw the Praisesingers fall back at the sound of his voice. 

Cray-Gil shook his head and pointed at him.  "He's all alone and there's four of us!" his voice boomed, but it sounded thin underneath.

"But sir, he's...he's _Flamebird."_   Mor-Vun's voice wavered slightly.

"And he's not alone."  Bruce's enhanced voice was soft and silky;  even with his suit muffling the awe-generator, Clark could hear the menace and the relish in it.  The Nightwing armor seemed to materialize out of nowhere, black metal glowing against the darkness of the street.  With a snap, the staff of black light appeared in his hand.  "You've hurt the people of Kandor.  We will not tolerate this."

For a frozen moment the six suited figures faced each other.  Below them, Rish edged into the shadows and disappeared, fierce exultation glowing on her face. 

Clark felt that same exultation in his bones, in his sinews.  His body tensed, his heart pounded.  He waited for the tipping point, for the wave of battle to break over them.

It felt good.

One of the Praisesingers snapped and lunged at Nightwing.  Clark ignored him and went straight for Cray-Gil;  behind him he could hear Moonbeam clashing against armor like music.  Cray-Gil was a good fighter.  Flamebird's sword struck sparks and flame from his enemy's armor;  Cray-Gil parried and swung back at him.  Flamebird caught the attack with a splayed wing and threw him sideways just in time to spot another Praisesinger coming at him.  Mor-Gil was younger and less experienced;  a shield-bash knocked him spiraling toward the ground.  The city whirled beneath Clark as he looped away from the hapless man.

"Time to pull out some rhetoric if you've got the breath, Clark," Bruce muttered over their private channel, and Clark pulled himself from the exhilaration of battle to gather his thoughts.

 _"Hear me now, O noble city: / Rise you up and fight the reaver!"_ The rhythm of the poetry sang through the battle, the metallic beat of weaponry like a counterpoint.  _"Do not lose the light in darkness / Fight, my friends, for freedom's sake!"_   He could hear his voice ringing over the city as he dodged a flurry of attacks from two Praisesingers, air whistling past his helm.  The S-shield on Cray-Gil's armor loomed before him, and he cocked an arm to smash the damned thing into fragments...but the Praisesingers were falling back, one of them carried limp between two others.

Flamebird started after them, blood pounding in his head, through his body, wild and joyous, but Bruce's voice stopped him.  "No.  Let them fall back.  Let them be seen defeated.  It's enough for today."

They had won.

Clark took a deep breath, but his heartbeat was still singing within him.

They had won.

 **: : :**

"--And now I need to find _another_ Tommy.  I don't know why, I just couldn't...stand this one any more."  Kal-El knew he sounded querulous, but he couldn't help it.  He lifted his mother's limp hand in his and held it to his forehead, but it didn't help.  "Oh Mother, I really do need you to come back.  I don't think I can do this much longer without you," he whimpered quietly.

The door flew open and Kal whirled to glare at the interloper.  He relaxed when he saw it was Cray-Gil, then narrowed his eyes at the sight of the other man's armor, dented and torn.  "What happened, Cray-Gil?"

The chestnut-haired Praisesinger caught his breath, dropping to one knee.  "Your Majesty!  In the Alien Quarter, we encountered two men in power suits.  They were--" for just a bare moment, a quaver of awe touched his voice, "--they were in the form of Nightwing and Flamebird, my Lord.  They challenged us, and we...were forced to take an expeditious retreat."

In Kal's hand, his mother's fingers twitched and tightened on his. 

"Clark," she murmured, smiling.  She said another name as well, but Kal was distracted by her use of his name from that other world, the world where he had been a bad man.  That was his secret name, and he wasn't allowed to use it here.  Mother usually got very angry when he called himself "Clark."  But it didn't matter, what she called him didn't matter, when she opened her brilliant, beautiful eyes and smiled.

"Mother!"  Kal embraced her, tears of joy prickling his eyes.  His mother would make everything better now, they would destroy this Nightbird and Flamewing or whoever they were, and maybe then she could help him find a Tommy with the right eyes at last.

Saturn Queen caressed her false son's dark hair, soothing the pain in his fractured brain somewhat.  Tears of matching joy slid from her eyes and down her cheeks. 

It had all been worth it.  The risk, the pain.  Her sons were here.  Soon everything would be right again.

 **: : :**

 ****The golden armor opened smoothly and Clark stumbled out of it, laughing exultantly, his heart pounding.  The Nightwing armor was hardly open all the way before he was tugging Bruce from it, whirling him in a circle of joy.  "Did you see them run?  Did you _see_ them?"  He couldn't seem to calm down, he wanted, he wanted to...he needed...

He kissed Bruce, his breath short, desire pounding through him uncontrollably, staggering together to a bench, his knee pressed between Bruce's legs, urgent and needing.  "Lube...tell me you've got something we can use for lube," he gasped.  Bruce scrabbled through a drawer full of wires and crystals to come up with a tube of some kind of lotion as Clark tore at his clothes, he had to get at Bruce's bare skin, had to, he couldn't possibly wait.  Bruce's hand stroked across the bulge in his pants and he heard himself panting, it would be so good, the release, the release...

Bruce felt Clark's muscles tense suddenly, heard his gasps of pleasure and laughter turn to something else.  "No, no," Clark muttered, going still, his body tense and rigid.  "That's not--" he threw back his head, his eyes closed, "--that's not me _,_ that's not _me_ , that's _him_ , I'm not, I'm not like this, _no."_   Hysteria edged the Kryptonian's voice and he slid his body against Bruce's with a sharp urgency that belied his words, his eyes still closed.  "Not me.  Fighting doesn't make me...make me want..."

"Clark.  Clark."  Bruce shook his shoulders gently, then harder when the other man just closed his eyes more tightly and groaned.  "You're here now.  With me.  Those memories...they might have shown you something you don't like about yourself, but we can deal with it.  You're here with me now."  He leaned forward to kiss the base of Clark's throat and Clark moaned and thrust against him, sliding Bruce's hands down to his hips, his ass.

"I want you so much.  Right now."

"Open your eyes first.  Look at me."

Turquoise eyes fluttered open, dazed and shadowed with lust.  Bruce put his hand on Clark's chest.  " _You're_ here now, with _me._   Not them."

Clark put his hand over Bruce's like a lifeline, held on.  He nodded wordlessly, and Bruce slid his hand lower to unbuckle Clark's pants.  "And this is for _me,_ not him, Clark."  Clark tossed his head like a restive horse, shuddering.  But he didn't protest as Bruce undid his pants, didn't pull away when Bruce turned around to press his naked back up against Clark, inviting.

Clark's thrusts were fierce and greedy.  He gasped every time he slid back into Bruce, and phrases were dragged from him as if by the force of his motion.  "Want you so much...need you so much, _mithen_...it scares me..."

Bruce arched against Clark, feeling Clark's breath hot on the back of his neck, desire tightening his body toward climax with every thrust.  "It doesn't frighten me," he breathed just before the tension broke, as he felt his body cascading past his mind into bliss.  "Never."  



	11. Confessing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clark and Bruce play around with Bruce's voice-enhancing gadget, which apparently has _no effect on Clark whatsoever._ Nope.

"It just all seems so...melodramatic." Bine Lor-Malu, Head Mother of the Church of Kal-El in the Alien Quarter, sighed and poured out tea for her two guests.  The familiar ritual of tea-pouring soothed her nerves somewhat:  the glowing liquid in the white china cups, the fragrant steam, the rhythms of steeping and pouring.  It kept her mind from the enormity of what she was considering.

"I understand," one of the two men said reassuringly.  Brus-We lifted his cup as if he were used to being served fine tea every day.  He had an easy grace about his movements, as well as a sense of latent danger, somehow.  "I know it's a huge decision."

"Oh dear, my boy, it's not that I don't know it's the right decision.  The atrocities against the alien population are intolerable.  It's just...it all sounds like a plot from a drama.  I'm hardly a likely character to be playing the dangerous rebel sympathizer," she said, waving a hand helplessly at her parsonage office:  the knitted afghans, scattered knick-knacks, dingy furniture.

The other person in her office, Klar-Ken, was a handsome young man, his figures aquiline and aristocratic behind the owlish glasses, with an incongruously shy smile.  "Believe it or not, I know exactly how you feel," he said, and gave her one of those smiles now.  Bine found herself thinking that it was a smile that made you want to live up to the hope in it. 

She lifted her cup and started to make the traditional Symbol of Blessing before drinking, the sketched gesture across the chest, but stopped at the look on Klar's face.  "I'm sorry, dear, it's habit," she said, wrapping her aching fingers around the warm cup handle.  "I know it offends you."

Klar blushed and looked uncomfortable.  "It's not that it offends me.  I just don't think Kal-El is a holy figure, that's all."

Bine sighed and looked down into her tea cup, swirling the amber liquid thoughtfully.  "I agree he was just a man...but I grew up praying to his spirit for guidance, asking myself in difficult situations:  What would Kal-El do?  It is...difficult to let go of such beliefs, even when I see them being used by the evil and unscrupulous.  I've tried my whole life to live in a way that he would approve of."

There was a long silence, in which Klar continued to look uncomfortable.  After a while, Brus said softly, "I'm sure he would approve of you."

Bine drained her cup and chuckled.  "Well, I'm hardly likely to find out, am I?"  She put the teacup down and addressed the pair more briskly.  "So you're telling me you've started an actual resistance cell among the Kryptonian population?"

Brus's eyes gleamed and he sat forward in his chair.  "Yes.  We finally have a small group of contacts there.  We delivered some communiques to them a few days ago, but we need a more reliable contact, someone trusted in the Kryptonian community, who can act as a go-between."

"Oh my," said Bine, laughing, "I'm going to be a spy!  How exciting." 

Klar's face was solemn.  "It could be dangerous.  If we start using the church as a meeting place...the risk to you could be high."

Bine reached out and patted the boy on the shoulder, touched by his concern.  "Child, this place has been a repository for deception and xenophobia for too long.  It's time it was used for something worthwhile for a change."

Another one of those lovely smiles.  "Thank you."

Bine found herself smiling back, irresistibly.  It was that kind of smile.  "You may tell a nosy old lady to butt out if you wish, but I'm curious how the two of you came to be living in the Alien Quarter and fomenting a rebellion?"

Brus brushed a hand lightly across Klar's on the tablecloth.  "We met at work.  We worked together side by side for ages and it eventually...became something more, I guess.  We talked for hours on end about truth and justice--" A smile touched Klar's mouth as he looked down at his tea, "--and how best to go about implementing it in the world.  Eventually it just made sense see if there was anything we could do to help."  He looked at his _ilyon_ , who was still looking down at the table, and for an instant his eyes softened into something inexpressibly tender.  "Klar inspired me."

The other man's face was scarlet as he rolled a spoon about on the table.  "No, no, you were always the one who inspired me, Brus."

Bine laughed a little.  "It's always good to see young people so fond of each other."

Brus looked at her levelly, the smile gone.  "I love him."  Klar looked up at him abruptly and Bine wondered if that was the first time he had heard those words spoken about him. 

Bine smiled lightly to defuse some of the sudden intensity on Brus's face.  "It shows."

As she showed them out and they walked to their motorcycles, Klar suddenly turned around and ran up the steps, taking her hands in his.  "I think you're very brave," he said abruptly, "And I know you're doing the right thing."  He flashed her a last smile and ran back to the bike.

Bine watched them drive off together. 

For a change, her hands felt warm.

 **: : :**

 ****"You could tell her the truth, you know."  The table in front of Bruce was covered with crystals, wires, and incongruous bits of black ribbon.  "It wouldn't kill her to know you're Kal-El.  And she'll probably find out from one of the rebels eventually."

Clark was standing in front of the laundry machine.  He held up a mauve shirt, considering whether it counted as "dark" or "light."  Then he gave up and just tossed them all into the machine together.  "I know.  I just...can't quite bring myself to do it.  I want her to see me as a normal person, with all my flaws, for as long as possible."

"Flaws?  You?"  Bruce's voice was comically incredulous as carefully soldered two lengths of wire together.

"Well, for starters, I can't do laundry worth a damn."

"Indeed, my formerly-white and now-pink boxers speak to this terrible character defect."

Clark poured soap into the machine and banged the lid down.  "Don't make fun of me, Bruce."

"Someone has to, Clark."  Bruce hummed tunelessly to himself for a few moments, then thumped his fist gently on the table in satisfaction.  "There.  I think it's done."

"What is it?" Clark asked idly, crossing the room to look more closely. 

Bruce held up what looked like about a foot of wide black ribbon with a small crystal attached to it.  It looked rather like a choker.  "That crystal is a modified version of the voice enhancer I've been working on," Bruce said smugly.  "Just put that around your neck and it should add the effect to your voice even without the suit."  He picked up a tiny numbered dial.  "The strength can be controlled from a distance."  At Clark's look, Bruce said quickly, "It's pragmatic, Clark!  There may well be situations where it would be good to have the persuasive boost when in civilian dress."

Clark eyed the choker dubiously.  "So you haven't spent the last four hours working on some kind of kinky sex toy?"

"I didn't say that," Bruce said, smirking slightly.  "I do need to do some test runs on the effect, after all..." 

He lifted the ribbon toward Clark, who stepped backward.  "You've got to be kidding, Bruce!  I'm spending all my time here working on _not_ being worshiped!"  He remembered his reaction to Bruce's voice when enhanced:  the rush of awe, the ecstatic desire to do what the voice told you to do, to submit...  "I'm not positive that's something I want to be playing around with."

"That's different.  I know you, so I know it's just a game.  Honestly, Clark, have you _ever_ known me to hold you in much awe?"  Bruce's eyebrows almost vanished into his hair at the idea.

Clark shook his head stubbornly.  "If it's got to be tested, you can test it on me.  The effects on Kryptonians are what's important anyway."

Bruce rolled his eyes.  "All right, all right."  He handed Clark the little dial.  "You can choose how strong it goes."

Clark looked at the dial and snorted with sudden laughter.  "Bruce, you have the dial going to eleven."

"Of course it does!" Bruce said with relish, affecting a British accent.  "Most awe-inducing voice enhancers only go to ten, you know."

Clark stared at the little dial, currently on zero.  "What level was the one in the suit on?"

Bruce was tying the black ribbon around his neck.  "I think it was at eight or so."  He tapped lightly at his throat.  "All right, whenever you're ready, feel free to nudge the power up a bit."

Clark frowned.  "Let me just be clear here.  Are you planning on using this to get me into bed with you?  Because I'm perfectly happy to have sex with you without this."

Bruce's grin was lascivious.  "But you might be even happier with it."  He sighed at Clark's expression and sobered.  "I'll admit I'm wondering how sexual the effects are.  For all I know, the awe might block sexual response.  Or it might be based on sexual reaction.  It's an important difference.  I won't promise you I won't try to sweet-talk you into bed, but I promise I won't abuse the effect.  Trust me?"

"Of course I trust you," grumbled Clark.  He nudged the dial up to two, skipping one as a gesture of good faith.

There was a long pause.

"You have to actually _say_ something for it to work, you know," said Clark after a while.

Bruce cleared his throat, looking perhaps just the tiniest bit nervous.  It was a very charming throat-clearing, really.  Clark couldn't help smiling. 

"I'm really not sure exactly how this works," Bruce said.  "Kryptonian technology is incredibly esoteric, it's like working in the dark sometimes.  But there are so many amazing possibilities with the nanotech!  I wish I had more time to study it..." He trailed off, watching Clark's face.  "What are you smiling about?  How are you feeling?"

Clark shrugged.  "At this level I think it just accentuates your natural charm." 

"My...natural charm."  Bruce looked rather dubious.

"The effect isn't very noticeable, really," Clark said thoughtfully, and nudged the dial up to three.  "Go on.  You were talking about nanotech.  It was fascinating."

"It was?"  Clark nodded and waited for Bruce to say more.  It really was fascinating, he thought.  He'd never realized nanotech was so interesting.

"Well."  Bruce gathered his thoughts.  "It's a shame it won't work outside Kandor.  The circuitry just won't function if enlarged.  And I'm not sure I'd really want to entrust this kind of tech to anyone in authority...here..." He was watching Clark's face.

Clark frowned.  "Don't stop."  He looked at the dial and moved it up to four.  "It really doesn't seem to be doing much.  You should talk about something boring, see if you can convince me it's actually interesting."

"Nanocircuitry isn't boring?"

"Are you kidding?  I could listen to you talk about it all day."  It was true.  He'd never really realized how beautiful Bruce was when he was talking about his projects.  The energy and passion in his voice was actually a little overwhelming.  "I think I'm going to have to sit down, though," Clark said a little giddily, and went over to the bed, dropping onto it.  He waved at Bruce, grinning.  "Go on."  He felt so lucky to be able to listen to Bruce talk.  He couldn't seem to stop grinning.  So lucky.

"I think the enhancer is having an effect on you, Clark," Bruce said.  "Not that it's a bad effect, per se, but it's a little surprising that you don't seem to be aware of it.  It might be because you're increasing the level gradually."

Clark shook his head.  "I hate to disagree with you, Bruce."  He really did hate to disagree with Bruce.  It was almost painful, having to contradict someone who made such a compelling case.  He found himself desperately wanting to nod and agree with his lover that the device was affecting him, but he set his jaw stubbornly.  "I just don't see it.  I don't _feel_ it."  He nudged the dial to five.  "Are you sure it's not broken?"

Bruce sat next to him on the bed.  "I'm in a bit of a catch-22 here, Clark, you have to admit."

Clark did have to admit that.  "Yes."  He nodded and couldn't seem to stop for a while.  Bruce was staring at him.  "Yes.  Yes.  It must be very, um, difficult for you."  Bruce didn't say anything for so long that Clark started to feel anxious.  "Aren't you going to keep talking?"

"Do you like the sound of my voice?"  Bruce's voice was a little husky.  It was the most beautiful sound Clark had ever heard in his life.  He nodded wordlessly again.  "How are you feeling, Clark?"

Clark considered.  "Fine.  I want to hear you talk some more."  Bruce swallowed hard and began to talk about nanotech again. 

Actually, Clark realized, he wished there was something he could do for Bruce.  Some way to pay him back for letting him listen to that perfect voice.  Clark let the words wash over him like light, savoring the angles of the other man's face.  He absent-mindedly ticked the dial up to six and Bruce fell silent.  "Go on," Clark said.  "I'm just checking to see if this thing is going to have any effect at all."

"It's having an effect, Clark."

"Nonsense," Clark scoffed, although it almost broke his heart to say it.  It would be so much more pleasant to agree.  "I'm not under any compulsion to obey you at all.  You tell me to do something, I'll just laugh at you."

Bruce narrowed his eyes.  "Take off your glasses."

Clark could have refused, of course, but it was such a little request.  It wasn't like he needed to have his glasses on anyway, so he reached up and slipped them off, handing them to Bruce. 

"Thank you," Bruce said a little wryly, and Clark felt his breath catch:  Bruce was thanking _him,_ when it felt so good to do what he asked that Clark should be thanking _him._ A sort of calm, placid ecstasy seemed to be spiraling through his body and mind.  He realized he'd been hoping Bruce would tell him to do something so that he could choose to obey, freely.  Choose it.  All he had to do was obey and he could feel this way.  That voice was giving him this pleasure.  Clark wanted to weep at its kindness, its benevolence.

The dial was still on six.  Would there be even more of this feeling on seven?  Clark had to find out.  He moved it up another notch.

"Clark?"  The voice was edged with silver, beautiful almost beyond bearing.  Clark shivered and closed his eyes to hear it better. 

A long, hoarse breath.  That was beautiful too.  "You're going to _kill_ me when this is over," the voice said.  Clark winced at the idea, it hurt too much.  "I'm sorry," the perfect voice said more softly at the expression on Clark's face.  Apologizing to _him._   So much glory, apologizing to him.  Another long pause.  "Clark.  What do you want?"

That was easy.  "To make you happy."  He opened his eyes and met the dark blue ones near him, putting as much intensity and passion as he could into it.  "Tell me what to do to make you happy.  Please."

Cobalt eyes blinked.  "Take off your shirt."  Clark started to unbutton his shirt, his hands trembling almost uncontrollably, every button another surge of pleasure.  Words like crystal light continued to pierce him as he struggled to stay focused enough on the buttons.  "You want to make me happy.  You want to make me happy.  I don't even believe you sometimes, Clark.  You damn fool idiot."  Something had thickened the voice slightly, but the majesty of it still shone through clearly.  "You never did know a lost cause when you saw it.  You never give up."   Clark couldn't help moaning slightly as his hands fumbled wildly on the buttons, and the voice caught a little as it repeated,  "Never give up." 

Clark wasn't sure if it that was just an echo of the last sentence or a command in itself. 

He decided to assume the latter.

Clark finally finished the last button, slipped off his shirt, and looked up at the other man in triumph, grinning.  There was sudden movement and then Clark was being kissed on the lips, on the neck, on the shoulders, that impossibly good voice lifting him like remembered flight, better than flight.  Wrapping him in ecstasy.  Telling him what to do next, and next, and next.

 **: : :**

 ****Lying on the mattress quite a while later, sweaty and weary, Clark started to laugh.  "I must have looked entirely ridiculous," he said between chuckles.

Bruce had taken off the choker and was looking at him, unsmiling.  "No," he said.  "You looked many things, but never ridiculous." 

Clark's laughter died out at the look in his lover's eyes, but the feeling of well-being remained.  Bruce put out a hand and slipped the ribbon around Clark's neck.  "Your turn."  Clark started to protest, but Bruce shook his head.  "Don't force me to put it back on and make you use it on me."

Clark squinted as he tried to puzzle out the levels of control in that sentence, but eventually gave up and tied the ribbon around his neck.  He wasn't at all sure this would work as well in this direction.  Bruce put a shushing finger on Clark's lips and put the dial on five.  "You did a wonderful impersonation of a frog in slowly boiling water there, Clark," he said at Clark's surprised expression, "but I'd like to be fully aware of what's hitting me."

Clark sat up on the mattress to look more closely at Bruce, who rolled onto his back and propped himself up on his elbows, his eyes glinting with a complicated mix of anticipation and wariness.  Clark ran a hand down his lover's bare body.  "You're beautiful," he said softly.

Bruce made a small, guttural sound, his eyes going dark and heavy immediately.  He exhaled carefully.  "Oh."

"You're..." Clark groped for words even though he remembered perfectly well that he could probably recite the periodic table of elements and get Bruce excited at this level.  "I know this is totally crazy, Bruce, but I'm almost glad we got this time here.  I know it's a horrible world and we need to fix it, but this time together, it means so much to...to me..."  He trailed off to watch Bruce pant and stare at him, his arousal clear.  "Bruce?"

Bruce made a barking sound like laughter, trembling on the verge of a moan.  "When I make a sex toy, I don't do it...by halves."  He licked his lips.  "What do you want, Clark?  You name it, I'm yours.  Anything you want."  He paused, struggling, and added softly, "Please."

Clark opened his mouth, closed it again.  "Tell me you love me," he said.

Bruce's face went stiff, his eyes wary, almost hurt.  "I said it just earlier today," he said.

"You told Bine, not me.  You've never told me directly.  I want to hear you say it."

"I..." Bruce bit his lip, not gently.  "I basically tell you so in all sorts of ways."

"I know.  But I'd like the direct words.  Please."

Bruce's voice sounded torn from him, wrung with sudden pain. " _Can't you tell?"_

 __Clark put his hands in Bruce's hair and pulled the other man to him, feeling him trembling.  "I'm sorry.  Of course I can.  I'm sorry."

"It's just--"  Bruce's voice was brittle, "--If I tell you I love you, then I should have told Selina.  Or Sasha.  Or Silver.  And if I should have told them...then certainly I should tell Tim.  And if Tim, then Dick.  Jason.  Barbara.  Alfred.  So many people I have to tell.  That I didn't.  So I can't.  Ever begin." 

Clark held him and just rocked back and forth for a while, unspeaking.  After a while, Clark heard the dial tick twice more, up to seven, and Bruce whispered, so quietly Clark almost missed it, "Try again." 

Clark took a breath.  "I know you love me, Bruce," he said into dark hair, feeling the other man jolt against him at the sound of his voice, "I know it.  I trust you.  And I love you.  But I want to hear you say it so much.  I want to hear you say you love me and know you mean it.  Please."

Bruce said something muffled against Clark's shoulder, shuddering with grief or with pleasure.  He pulled back, falling onto the pillows, his eyes closed as if against bright sunlight.  "I love you, I love you, Clark," he gasped.  Then he said it again, and then again, lost in rapturous rhythm, until Clark had to kiss him to stop the words.  Bruce shook against him, transported by Clark's voice, as Clark told him how much he loved him, with words and without, and Bruce answered him.

With words and without.

 **: : :**

The room was dark and Clark was half-asleep when he felt a hand slide up his chest and touch his neck, sliding across bare skin--the choker had been taken off in the aftermath.  Bruce's hand rested on his bare throat, warm and gentle.  There was a long, contemplative pause.

"I love you," said Bruce into the darkness.


	12. Shattering

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Alien Quarter of Kandor celebrates the Festival of Flame, with disastrous results.

"I've got a bad feeling about this."

Bruce looked up from the boots he was lacing.  "I'm not too keen on it either, Clark.  But the Festival is an important one among the non-Kryptonian population.  They canceled it last year, but they won't listen to reason this year."  He stood up and looked in the mirror;  a frowning, saturnine face looked back at him.  The Festival of Flame was an important holiday on various of the alien population's home planets:  a night of carousing and pleasure to celebrate the forces of chaos in the cosmos.  It was strictly banned in Kandor since the return of Kal-El.  But the aliens were holding it anyway tonight.

"We should be patrolling in the armor."

"And we will.  But we have to make an appearance in civilian garb first, so people can say they saw us there in case some of the pretender's people try to track Nightwing and Flamebird down.  A half-hour, no more."

The frown on the face in the mirror deepened.  Bruce Wayne reached up and tousled his own hair slightly.  The frown disappeared, replaced by--if not a smile, at least the pleasant potential for a smile.  The eyes shone with anticipation of the fun of the Festival, flicking over to take in the form of his handsome lover.  The potential smile moved into reality, curving the mobile mouth slightly.

Brus-We looked out of the mirror at Bruce Wayne. 

Bruce reached out and touched the mirror image gently.

Clark came up behind him and put his arms around him.  "About ready to go?"  He nuzzled Bruce's neck lightly. 

Bruce tilted his head back into Clark's embrace and watched Brus's face in the mirror, the dark blue eyes filled with affection and warmth as he enjoyed his lover's touch. 

"I think I'm ready," he said.

 **: : :**

 ****Ch'k'rt's many arms were a blur of motion as she served slices of _ilya_ at half-price to all comers.  "Klar!"  she exclaimed as two of her favorite customers approached.  "Double serving, for you!"  Clark took the dripping slices of fruit from her and handed one to Bruce.  "Bonfire will be lit soon," chattered the fruit vendor cheerfully.  "Welcome in the light of All soon!  Go, go, get your mask!"  She gestured with one free hand toward another crowded booth.

Clark and Bruce approached the busy booth, nibbling on the bittersweet fruit and skirting a huge pile of kindling in the center of the square.  It reeked of some flammable liquid.  "They should be more careful with that stuff," frowned Bruce.

Clark laughed and licked juice off his fingers.  "The Festival of Flame is not exactly a time to practice _caution_ , Bruce.  It's a celebration of anarchy and chaos, not obeying fire restrictions."  Around them the square seethed with masked celebrants, many already half-intoxicated.  "There'll be rutting in the streets later," he noted.

Bruce reached out and hooked an arm through his.  "Is that a _promise?"_ the other man purred, and Clark felt the still-disorienting leap of desire flare through him, the raucous sounds around them growing dim in the tide of need.

Bruce smiled slightly and tugged at him, and Clark realized he had stopped dead in the street, staring at his lover.  He closed his mouth.   He was fairly sure he looked like a damn idiot at least half the time with Bruce and he just felt lucky the other man was willing to overlook it.

The booth was handing out free masks:  light, papery ovals patterned with wild designs.  Clark found one that had a midnight-blue shape that could, if one squinted, be taken for a bat and lifted it toward Bruce.  Bruce smiled and shook his head.  "I like this one," he said, holding up a mask covered with gold spirals and silver stars.  Then he picked out a red-and blue-checkered mask for Clark, who took it with a sardonic grin.  Slipping on their masks, they wandered into the chaos of the Festival.

Clark had to hold on to Bruce's hand to avoid being swept away from him in the crowd.  All around them were people embracing, dancing around the unlit pyre with no music but their passion and the rhythm of the crowd.  The sweetness of the _ilya_ was in Clark's mouth, the warmth of Bruce's hand was against his skin, the beauty of Bruce's movements through the crowd in his eyes.  Everything seemed at once to be falling into chaos and to be transcending into a new and different kind of order.  His hand tightened on Bruce's almost involuntarily.

A figure, heavily robed and masked and holding a torch, climbed the platform to stand beside the wooden pyre.  It stood motionless, the torch flaring above it, and cried out something in an alien language.  The crowd roared approval.  The next shout was in a different language, and the next;  Clark concluded that it was the same phrase in the languages of the people who celebrated the Festival of Flame.  Finally the figure paused and declared in Kryptonian:  "To the Fire!  To Life!" 

The crowd howled assent as the figure touched the torch to the massive pile of wood.

Heat washed Clark's face as the bonfire burst into flame.  The crowd burst simultaneously into frenzied, chaotic dance, flowing around Clark and Bruce with raw urgency, shrieking in various languages, stomping and howling. 

Somehow Bruce's hands were sliding down the front of his jacket and stroking across the front of his pants, the silver-and-gold mask inscrutable and shining as a moon.  Clark struggled to cling to rationality in the midst of chaos as the mob surged around them uncaring, no one even seeming to notice that Bruce was unbuttoning the first button of his fly, and it looked like he was going to go down on his knees right there in the street...

The pyre exploded into cinders and flying fragments.  A shard of wood whined past Clark's cheek, and he heard cries of pain.

He looked up to see himself.

Floating in the air, eyes glowing.

Himself.

Beside him, his mother.  Saturn Queen.  Her copper hair unbound and flowing behind her, her eyes cold and lovely as they scanned the crowd.

Himself.  From that other world.  It had to be, if _she_ was with him.

Himself.

 _Bruce's brother._

 __He heard Bruce's whisper as if from far away:  "Hide, Clark!"  and he put his mind behind the barriers they had learned how to erect as children when they wanted to hide from their mother.  She had pretended to be angry and worried when they did it.  It had been a game they played.

In the sky, Kal-El, Lord of Kandor, floated like a god, his eyes pitiless crimson, his face unearthly and perfect.  Clark felt like he was falling, staring at that figure.  Falling, and no one to catch him.  He certainly wasn't Superman here, and if that was Kal-El, and if that was Bruce's brother Clark...

Echoing corridors of black fire.  A pulling feeling.  Scenery went by.  Behind him there was screaming, a roaring ripple of flame.  Kal-El was.  Clark was.  Was doing that.  He was doing that.

Cooler air.  A voice, very far away.  "Jesus, Clark, don't make me do this."  But Clark was back there, in the air with Bruce's mother.  There wasn't anything to answer.

A sharp sound, flesh on bone.  Pain in his face.  "We don't have _time_ for this."  Bruce's voice, furious, snapping at him like a whip.  "People are _dying_ back there.  Stop wasting time, Clark!"

Clark stumbled forward, past Bruce, toward the storehouse with the armor, breaking into a run as he got his feet under him.  Behind him, Bruce's footsteps pounded in rhythm with the screams and flame in the square.

 **: : :**

"My children have chosen chaos over order, and anarchy over peace.  It grieves me to correct your ways, but correct them I shall, to better lead you from darkness into light."  Kal-El let the words flow from his mother's mind into his, moving his mouth with the beautiful, elegant sounds.  Below him he could see the aliens cringing, cowering, their faces streaked with tears and splashed with terror and awe.  He raised his hands against the fire-lit sky.  "I wish only to bring you wisdom, O Lesser Children of Kandor!" 

Mother was with him now.  She would make him a god.

Kal-El swooped down and caught up a shrieking alien, preparing to toss it in the air and skewer it with heat vision.  He was the Bringer of Judgment, and any he chose to punish were guilty by definition.  With a contemptuous flick of his hand, he sent the alien whirling upward--

Something slammed into him and his heat vision only clipped his target.  There was a flash of gold as a figure skimmed past him to catch the falling alien, but Kal's attention was taken up with the black-armored knight launching a furious volley of blows at him.  Black wings spread like a swan's, face covered with an ornate wrought visor, the figure struck at him with such strength that Kal could _feel_ it.

//Fall back, Mother!  I can deal with this!//  He didn't want to risk her so soon after getting her back. 

There was a warm smile in his mind, and his mother's presence retreated from him.

The blows from this "Nightwing" were beginning to sting.  The golden-armored Flamebird was darting around the square putting out fires, catching debris--Kal focused his attacks on Nightwing.  The figure was surprisingly quick and resilient, dodging his blows and continuing to strike at him. 

"Avaunt, pretender!" snarled Nightwing, and Kal felt a strange shock go through him.  The voice was that of a stranger, and yet there was something about it...some quality...

The staff connected with his chin and Kal snarled in annoyance.  Below him Flamebird was still working to get the civilians to safety.  On a hunch, Kal broke away from his attacker to send a lance of heat vision at the golden figure, feeling a glow of satisfaction as Flamebird dropped the chunk of concrete he was holding to stagger and Nightwing gasped involuntarily.

Nightwing snarled something unintelligible and redoubled his efforts, the staff whining and crackling in his hands.  A wing of black metal buffeted Kal, forcing him to focus on the black knight again.  But the ferocity of the knight's attack cost him in precision, and Kal was able to land one good shot on the black visor. 

It cracked wide open and for a moment Kal could see the eyes of the man inside.  They were sapphire-blue, blazing with rage, contempt, and defiance.

Time seemed to stand still for Kal. 

Those eyes.  __

_Tommy's eyes!_

He was so totally confounded that he didn't make any effort at all to block the shining staff and it caught him right between the eyes at the same moment that Flamebird caromed into him from behind.  Startled and confused, with desire, yearning, and hatred battling in him, Kal floundered backwards, took a last long look at those glorious eyes, and fled.

 **: : :**

Clark was lying on the mattress in their little apartment.  After "Kal-El" had quit the scene, there had still been clean-up to do:  debris to clear, injured to be tended, the dead to be cared for.  Bine Lor-Malu had come from the Church of Kal-El to nurse the wounded, her quiet care a silent apology that no one could reject.  Ch'k'rt had lost a limb and lay, shaking and pale, on a stretcher.  Clark, the armor safely stored, had knelt beside her to listen to her murmur deliriously about how Lord Flamebird had caught her out of the sky to safety.  Rish, Harrn, and Basqat had been only slightly injured and helped Clark and Bruce prepare shelter for the aliens whose homes had been destroyed.

There was no adrenaline rush tonight, just two exhausted men huddled together.  Bruce pulled Clark into the hollow of his body, wrapping his arms around the Kryptonian.

Clark hadn't spoken to Bruce since the attack.  He stirred and spoke now, his voice thick with exhaustion and grief:  "I'm sorry."

Bruce buried his face in dark hair, smelling smoke.  "That wasn't..."  He didn't know exactly how to finish the sentence:  "you"?  "him"?  "It wasn't," he repeated, knowing Clark would understand.

" _She_ was there.  So he was...your brother."  Clark's voice seemed disconnected from reality.

" _No."_   Bruce let his vehemence roughen his voice and felt Clark focus on it.  "His fighting style was all wrong.  _She's_ taught him some basic Kryptonian moves, but his approach is all different from yours.  It's...crude, underneath the polish.  Blunt.  He doesn't fight anything like you."  He paused, then forced himself to state it plainly.  "You're beautiful in the air, it loves you.  You fight like an avenging angel.  Whoever that was, he fights like a fist, like he's going to force the sky to hold him up with threats.  It's..." It all sounded ridiculous and mystical;  he shrugged uncomfortably.  "All I know is that wasn't any version of you I've ever known.  You have to believe me, Clark."

There was a very long silence in which Bruce felt Clark's muscles relaxing, very slowly, as if he was afraid to let go of the tension, afraid to relax into Bruce's clasp.  After a while, Bruce asked softly, "Do you believe me?"

"I'll...try to," Clark said slowly. 

Bruce managed to chuckle.  "At last you have attained wisdom, Grasshopper."

A faint breath that could almost have been a laugh.  "I suppose it's never too late."

Bruce let smoke-scented hair brush his face, his lips, and held Clark until the other man fell asleep.

 _Never too late._

 __

 __  



	13. Pledging

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce comes up with a novel way to get around new restrictions on the alien population.

Basqat threw the flier down in front of the assembled rebels.  It fluttered to the floor, the Kryptonian on it clear:  Public Gatherings Prohibited.  "I told the Council of Elders the Festival of Flame would end in disaster," he snarled, the nictating membranes on his jet-black eyes blinking madly.  "Would they listen to me?  _No!"_

Bruce sighed and picked up the crumpled paper.  "They've also entirely cut off all traffic to and from the Alien Quarter.  Not even Kryptonians are allowed to pass through the checkpoints.  That means we can't get in touch with our contacts on the outside.  We're totally isolated."

Harrn made an uncomfortable whuffling noise.  "What's going to happen next?"

Bruce looked at Clark;  Clark dropped his gaze to the ground.  Bruce steeled himself to meet Basqat's eyes.  "Throughout history, once a minority population is concentrated in one place and isolated from the rest of the world, the next inevitable step is...attempted liquidation."

A rustling murmur through the group, a gasping sob;  Basqat's expression indicated he wished Bruce had said that in private.

"That's not going to happen."  Clark's voice was low but had steel beneath it.  He seemed to have recovered from his breakdown during the false Kal-El's attack and had thrown himself into repair work and strategy with grim efficiency, working himself until he dropped for the past two days.  His powerlessness bothered him enough when he _wasn't_ surrounded by injuries and damage.

Bruce could only hope that he had gotten through to the Kryptonian that the murderous Kal-El on his throne in the capital was not Saturn Queen's son, not Bruce's brother.  Bruce knew it, felt it in his bones and in his blood, as sure as sunlight.  He had never held that man close and called him brother, never submitted to him in love.  Impossible.

If only he could be sure Clark knew it as well.

Bruce looked down at the creased piece of paper, reading the fine print.  After a moment, he spoke again.  "We need to get in touch with the people outside, have a last chance to organize.  There are two exceptions to the bans listed here, two excuses that we could use to have a public gathering and meet with Kryptonians from the rest of the city.  One is that funerals are allowed to be held at the Church of Kal-El."

Harrn growled angrily.  "We've just finished consecrating our recent dead.  Would you like us to make more for your political ends?"

Bruce shook his head.  He was trying not to smile, and he was sure the resulting facial expression was quite odd.  "The other exception is for a different ceremony held at the Church of Kal-El."  He handed the flier to Basqat and walked over to Clark.  As Clark stared at him blankly, he said, "I know I'm taking advantage of you here because you can't really say no, but I can't pass up the opportunity."

Bruce sank to one knee in front of Clark, taking his hand.  " _Ilyon,_ will you pledge your troth to me for all our days remaining?"  The formal Kryptonian phrase. 

Then he added in English, for good measure,  "Will you marry me?"

 **: : :**

"So...because I asked Klar to marry me, that makes me the _uud_ in this ceremony?"  Clark watched Bruce's eyebrows rise as he examined a table covered with paper and scraps of cloth, Bine sitting on one side.  "What exactly does that mean?"

Bine's voice was patient as she explained the customs of the Church of Kal-El to the apparently-clueless young man.  "It doesn't mean much nowadays.  In the past it meant you were required to pledge your support to your _riay_ , and your _riay_ was required to promise to obey you in all things.  But we don't do that anymore."  Bruce shot Clark a sardonically laughing look as the priestess continued.  "Now it's mostly symbolic:  Klar will light his candle from yours instead of the opposite, and you're required to wear the traditional burgundy robes while Klar wears white."

Clark listened as Bine explained exactly how the ceremony would run, watching Bruce moving around red and white cloth like puzzle pieces, matching them up...

"Do we really need to spend so much time on these things?" Clark heard himself say almost harshly.  "Isn't the real point to give people a chance to meet and plan?  The details don't really matter."

Bine looked surprised.  "Child, at a pragmatic level it's important that nothing seem suspicious or dubious.  At a more important level, though, these details matter because your union matters.  The wedding is an excuse, yes, but it's also real, isn't it?"  The question was rhetorical and Bine didn't wait for an answer.  "I understand that formalities are not really of the essence, but they're not merely fripperies, either."  She smiled at him, and Clark felt abashed before her openness. 

Bruce rested a hand on his, briefly, the thumb brushing across his knuckles.  "I want to get this right," he said earnestly to the priestess.  His hand was warm on Clark's.

Clark couldn't seem to find the words to ask what he needed to ask.  He couldn't even seem able to form the question clearly in his own heart.

Bruce smiled at Clark from across the table.

Brus smiled at Klar.

Masks beneath masks.  Which was it?  Did it matter?

 **: : :**

A week of whirlwind preparation flew by.  Praisesinger patrols were more common.  They seemed to be surveying the area carefully.  Nightwing and Flamebird met up with them most nights;  they usually fell back after a quick clash.  The mythical avatars were clearly not their first priority.

Bruce seemed filled with nearly manic energy, planning guerrilla strikes and reception refreshments with equal gusto.  At the moment he was trying to fix a thruster on the Flamebird armor while debating cake flavors, implausibly enough, with Harrn.  The huge, hairy alien was insisting on the benefits of a fruit-flavored cake.  Bruce was stubbornly sticking to chocolate.  They had been forced to forgo the traditional Kryptonian tradition of the couple cutting their way out of the cake--much to Clark's relief--due to food shortages.  Clark was going over one of the few sketchy diagrams they had to the royal palace for perhaps the hundredth time, listening to the argument with one ear and sometimes glancing over.

"Could you hand me that socket wrench, Rish?  The biggest one, there."  Bruce scratched at his eyebrow and left a dark smudge behind.  "Look, fruit's tasty and all, Harrn, but I always promised myself if I got married--which I never thought particularly likely--I would like a chocolate cake."  Harrn continued his pro-fruit tirade, but Bruce cut him off.  "Besides, Klar's favorite cake is chocolate," he said as if that settled the matter conclusively.

"Why didn't you think you'd get married?"  Rish cut in curiously from her perch on a nearby bench after handing him the wrench.  Her wings fluttered behind her as she leaned forward.

"First:  No one seemed likely to be able to put up with me," Bruce said cheerfully.  "Second:  My job comes first, and I thought it unlikely I would fall in love with someone who could appreciate that."

"You don't seem _so_ difficult to put up with," Rish said, hiding a giggle behind her hand.

Bruce finished adjusting the thruster with a last turn of the wrench.  "Looks can be deceiving," he said.  Picking up a small hammer, he began to gently bang a couple of dents out of the shining golden armor.  "I'm sure that to look at my pleasant and good-natured face one would never suspect I can be a truly cantankerous and hurtful bastard."  There was a pause in which he might have been looking at Clark, but Clark was studying the blueprints intently. 

Rish was still giggling at this ridiculous assessment of one of her knights in shining armor.  "But you still love him, right, Klar?  Even if he's a...a cantankerous bastard?"  Her wings trembled with the force of her laughter.

"I actually love him in part _because_ he's a cantankerous bastard," Clark said, looking down at his diagrams.  "Believe it or not."

"But wouldn't you love me more if I weren't?"  Clark looked over then, but Bruce wasn't looking at him any longer, if he had been before.  He had picked up a cloth and was meticulously polishing the breastplate of the golden armor, his hands tracing tiny circles on the shining, mirror-bright surface.

"I don't think I could possibly love you more than I do."  Clark tried to keep his voice light and bantering, but Rish stopped laughing and looked at him gravely.

There was a crashing noise that caused Clark to jump.  Harrn had brought his hands down hard on a cluttered bench, setting bits of metal dancing everywhere.  "Fruit cake, damnit!" he bellowed as if the argument had never gotten derailed.  "It should be fruit!"

Bruce laughed and went back to arguing with Harrn about food options.  Clark returned to studying the maps of the palace.  Saturn Queen was in there somewhere, along with his doppleganger.  Clark saw again those burning eyes, the implacable god in the air, and felt himself fading into nothing before it.  But he remembered Bruce's voice and his touch, held onto them like a drowning man, and the sensation passed.  Bruce loved him, even if he had an odd and inexplicable way of showing it sometimes.

In a world so improbable as one in which Bruce loved him, anything was possible.

 **: : :**

Bruce listened to Clark breathing next to him, slow and steady.  He needed more sleep when he didn't have powers, and although Bruce had some more work he wanted to get done, Clark's sleep was precious.  Too often the Kryptonian woke up shaking with nightmares that would only be soothed away when Bruce held him and whispered his human name over and over.

Bruce protecting Clark from nightmares.  He smiled wryly into the darkness.  He never would have considered that very likely.

The man beside him stirred restlessly and muttered, "Bruce?"

"I'm here."

"I know."  Clark's voice was warm and blurry, content.  He curled an arm around Bruce, then continued.  "You know that Saturn Queen and--and her minion will know it's us at the wedding."

"Yes."

"That's dangerous for the other people.  Couldn't someone else--"

"You know only True Children can get married at the Church.  We're the only established Kryptonian couple in the Alien Quarter."  Clark said nothing, but his silence remained stubborn rather than accepting.  Bruce sighed.  "We have to hope he won't attack his own church.  But we'll be ready for them if they do.  We'll keep the armor stored nearby.  And no one will be there who isn't fully aware of the risk."  he heard Clark swallow.  "You know that if they're cutting off the ghetto, our time is running out.  They could simply starve them all.  We have to get in touch with the outside population."

Bruce stared at the ceiling for a long time.  Clark's voice, when it broke the silence again, revealed his thoughts had diverged somewhat:  "They won't let us finish the wedding." 

His voice was soft and neutral, with an undercurrent running under it that Bruce couldn't quite decipher:  challenging or reassuring, or maybe both.  "Well," he responded rather awkwardly, "They might try."

Clark shifted a little but didn't say anything more, and eventually his breathing moved back into the deep breaths of sleep.  Bruce couldn't quite understand how they could be so in tune with each other and yet have this strange silence between them, so much they couldn't seem to say to each other right now.  He wished, for a crazy moment, that Clark would put on the voice-enhancer again and tell Bruce what he needed to hear, make Bruce say what he needed to say.  What Bruce wanted to say.

He just hoped he could find the words on his own in time.


	14. Explaining

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A war conference, a conversation, and a wedding (holding a wedding in unlucky Chapter 13?  What were they thinking?)

The doors of the Church of Kal-El were festooned with maroon and white ribbons.  Leaves and petals carpeted the steps in preparation for the wedding couple.  The looming statue of Kal-El was still holding out a hand in benediction, but he was now holding a bouquet of flowers.  Someone had put a party cap on top of his head at a jaunty angle.

Clark stared at the statue, smiling a little.  Then he went inside.  The truly important part of the day was going to happen _before_ the ceremony, after all.

 **: : :**

"And we'll need you to be ready to sabotage some power plants if you see any sign the Praisesingers are moving on the alien population."  Van-Zee, the leader of the Kryptonian contingent, frowned at Basqat, but continued to listen.  The atmosphere of the meeting between the fifty or so Kryptonian sympathizers and the alien rebels had started off rather tense, but Van-Zee's charisma and sincerity seemed to be carrying the day.  Bruce and Clark were both doing their best to stay inconspicuous and let the two sides reach an understanding together.

"We have contacts with access to the plants.  We even have a few sympathizers working in the palace."  Basqat looked impressed.  "It's not an easy place to infiltrate, no."  Van-Zee sighed.  "Far too many of us are bedazzled by the fair face of the pretender, unable to see past his appearance to the shame he brings all of us." 

The Kryptonian reached into his bag and pulled out a crystal vase.  "My present to the happy couple," he said a bit wryly, then extracted a tiny chip from the base.  "This is the most detailed map of the palace we've been able to cobble together.  If it comes down to a full assault, we'll do our best to back you up."  He paused as Bruce pounced on the chip.  "We have a password we use between us.  It will mark you as a sympathizer.  We say, 'From your jail return to joy.'"

Bruce made a surprised, almost gratified sound.  "From the speech the spirit of Flamebird gives to Nightwing during his Trial, to break him from the illusion." 

Van-Zee nodded. 

"It's--my favorite part," Bruce said rather abruptly.

Harrn sighed in exasperation.  "You people and your _Sagas,"_ he muttered.  "Yeah, yeah, boss," he growled as Basqat opened his mouth, "Don't worry, I'll remember it."

"Speaking of Nightwing and Flamebird," Van-Zee noted, "Why are the blessed couple still here?"

Bine glanced at the clock and jumped up.  "Oh Rao, we have to get you two into the antechamber for your Preparation!"  She grabbed Clark and Bruce each by an elbow and hauled them to their feet.  "You still have to get dressed!  And have your Conversation!"

"Conversation?"  Harrn looked curious.

"The Conversation of Harmony.  The couple has to have a talk before the ceremony, a private moment to unburden their hearts to each other before they start their new life together.  Very important!"  She hustled the two men out of the room. 

As the door closed, they could hear Harrn remark, "My people just hang up the violet lantern and then couple.  Much simpler."

 **: : :**

 ****"Hey," Bruce said as the door closed behind Bine, leaving them alone.  "What are you doing?"

Clark held up the hanger with the white robe and the deep blue under-tunic on it.  "Getting dressed."

Bruce snatched the hanger from his hand.  "I've read up on Kryptonian ceremonies, and I know perfectly well we're supposed to dress each other."  He replaced the hanger.  "The _uud_ goes first."  He began to unbutton Clark's shirt slowly.  On the third button he paused.  "You're supposed to unburden your heart to me while I do this, Clark," he said, his eyes still on the buttons.

"I don't have any burdens on my heart, Bruce," Clark said, his voice tinged with exasperation.  There was a long pause in which Bruce fiddled with that button, unfastening and re-fastening it.  Clark reached up and touched Bruce's hands lightly.  "I love you.  I know you love me.  I don't need anything like this to prove it." 

Bruce began to move carefully down the shirt again, undoing each button with intense concentration.  Clark's voice was casual as he continued.  "I mean, look.  I fell in love with you over the course of a year, without those memories of the other life.  You--"  He paused as Bruce eased the shirt off his shoulders.  "For you, one minute we were friends, the next minute we'd spent lives together as lovers."  Bruce knelt to untie his shoes and Clark stared down at the dark head.  "In a way...you never really _fell in love_ with me, you know.  You just suddenly--loved me."  He stepped out of the shoes and let Bruce unbutton his fly and chastely slip his pants off.  Standing in his underwear, Clark cleared his throat.  "So I guess sometimes I worry that you're--I don't know--overcompensating.  Trying too hard to prove you love me, because it was...kind of thrust on you out of nowhere like that."

Bruce held up the dark blue under-tunic and slid it over Clark's head in silence.  Then the white linen robe, slit high up the sides to let the blue cloth show through. Clark let its folds settle over his head like feathers, like angel wings.  He closed his eyes.  "You don't need to try so hard, Bruce.  You don't need to do this to prove something to me.  I understand, I promise."

"You don't."  Clark opened his eyes.  Bruce's mouth was set in a hard line, his eyes like chips of glass.  "You don't understand at all."  He grabbed the hanger with the burgundy robe on it and thrust it at Clark like an accusation.  "Your turn."

There seemed to be an awful lot of little buttons down Bruce's shirt.  They were polished black stone, set into midnight-blue cloth.  Clark started down the row as Bruce started speaking.

"I took the _Sagas_ with me on the cruise.  To study my Kryptonian."  He sounded almost angry.  "Just in case you ever wanted to speak to me in it.    I read the scene where the Enemy traps Nightwing in that vision."

"The thorns," Clark said, his voice low.

Bruce nodded once.  "I read about how he saw the thorns growing all around him, cutting him off from everything, cutting into his heart.  And the Enemy said..."  He paused as if trying to remember it, but when he began again it was without any hesitation.  "Friendless and alone your fate is; /  No one near you in the darkness."

Clark straightened to slide the shirt off Bruce's shoulders;  Bruce shrugged it off almost irritably, but stilled as Clark ran his hands down the muscled arms very slowly, his eyes still lowered.  The Kryptonian knelt to slip his shoes off, hands lingering on his ankles, his insteps, fingers brushing across tendons and bone like harpstrings.

Bruce inhaled, a long, slow breath.  "I couldn't get that scene out of my head.  I would dream...of your voice, saying what Flamebird says to break the vision.  I wanted so much, _so much_ \--" his voice shook suddenly and he stopped for a moment, "--to hear you say it to me.  To have you tell me,  _from your jail return to joy._ "  Clark's hands were on his belt buckle now;  Bruce reached down to stop them.  "Clark.  This isn't easy for me, but I need--I need to say it.  I know you think I'm just playing at all this, this Brus stuff, being happy and flirting and..." he waved his arms to encompass the robes, the church, "...all this.  I'm not playing, Clark.  It's not a game.  It never could be.  Sometimes I...need another mask to hide behind to tell the truth.  But I mean all of it."  Clark's head was still bowed;  Bruce reached out and cupped his chin but didn't try to lift his face.  "You say you don't need this wedding.  I know that."

Bruce's fingers tightened very slightly, almost involuntarily, on Clark's chin.  "But I do, Clark."

Clark raised his gaze then.  His eyes were shining.  "Me.  I need it," Bruce said again, with a sort of desperate, urgent simplicity.  "I love you and I want to marry you, really marry you, I--"

Clark kissed him, turning his words into something stifled and choking, almost laughter, their shared breath sharp and simple and true.

"Thank you," Clark said after a while, touching his forehead to the other man's.

Bruce laughed, just a touch shakily.  "That's the last time you're getting straight talk from me for a while, you know.  It's way too stressful to get into the habit."

"I'll try to only need it every decade or so."

"Ten years?" Bruce said with mock-incredulity, "I'm going to need a good five or so just to recover from this bout."  He leaned into another kiss for a while.  "Being honest is like jumping off a building," he murmured against Clark's mouth.  "Jumping with no decel line at all."

"I'll always catch you, you know."

"I know.  That's why it's so terrifying."

Clark was reaching to unfasten Bruce's pants, still locked into a kiss, when the explosions and screaming started.

 **: : :**

 ****Clark dodged rebels scrambling for cover and dashed down the aisle with Bruce at his side, heading for the church exit in a surreal parody of a recessional.  The suits were right next door, they'd be there in a second...

Dust billowed around the two of them.  Bruce was slightly ahead of him.  Clark heard a cracking roar and turned without thinking to see the base of the statue of Kal-El give way beneath the thunderous tremors of the attack.  The statue tilted, slanted, started to fall toward a wide-eyed alien, no one Clark knew, someone who just happened to be walking by the church at the wrong time and was going to be crushed beneath a massive graven image...  
 **  
**Clark swiveled and ran back.  Bruce kept going toward the armor, unaware, as Clark put on a burst of desperate speed--why couldn't he move _faster,_ useless, the kid was going to die, _useless--_ and shoved the alien aside and to safety as the statue came down on him.

Crushing weight.  Darkness. 

 **: : :**

 ****Kal-El, Lord of Kandor, shattered another window, the stained glass fragments flying like colored knives around the church.  He kind of hated breaking the windows, because he looked damn good on them, but on the other hand it was fun to watch everyone inside cower and scream.

His kind of worship.

"We're going now, Kal!"  His mother's voice was sharp, almost exultant.  Kal turned to her, puzzled.

"But Tom--Nightwing isn't here yet.  You told me I could have him if I did this."

His mother floated up to him, a fierce smile on her lovely face.  She was carrying a limp body dressed in white and dark blue.  "I said, fall back.  We have what we need."  When Kal hesitated again, she repeated, //Fall back!// 

Her mental voice was like a whipcrack across the fractures and scars of his psyche, and he winced and followed her.  "I just wanted Tommy back where he belongs," he whispered sullenly, ashamed of the tears clogging his voice.

Saturn Queen alighted on the palace veranda.  "And you shall have your wish, dear heart.  He will come to you, here where you have the advantage, where your power is strongest.  Because we have this."  She tilted the head of the body she was carrying so Kal could see--his own face.

Anger, fury, terror roiled through him.  _This_ was why Tommy wasn't with him.  "I--I--"  he stammered, choking on rage.

His mother smiled sweetly.  "Everything will work out, dear.  Let's put him in one of the cells and get you recharged again."  She stood up, hoisting the body with some help from her flight ring, and gave Kal one of her most dazzling smiles.

Kal sighed.  She was right, of course.  He did need to be recharged.  He hadn't mentioned it to Mother, but lately he'd been running low on energy more quickly than usual.  He just needed a few more hours under the solar lamps.  He glared one last time at the body in her arms.

 _Later, you bastard._

 __  
**: : :**

Nightwing alighted in a jarring clatter on the church steps.  The crushed petals scattered below his descent.  "Where is he?  Where is Clark?"  Basqat shuddered and two rebels behind him fell to their knees;  Bruce snapped the visor up and repeated himself in a slightly more normal voice.

Rish was weeping.  " _She_ took him.  She took him and they went away, the cowards, the cowards--!"

Bruce's fury disappeared in an icy calm.  "Saturn Queen took Clark?  To the palace?"

Basqat seemed, if anything, more unnerved by Bruce's calm than by his rage.  "That was--the way they flew off."

"I'll get him back." He turned to go.

Basqat protested:  "Brus, we can't possibly provide the backup you'll need.  You'll be going in alone, to face what's almost certainly a trap.  Give us a couple of days to prepare, at least!"

The glittering black wings leapt up, quivering, but Bruce's face remained emotionless.  "In a situation where there's a telepath and a perfect double, the more time we give them, the more likely I'll be bringing back someone who will kill us all."  The wings continued to shiver, metal trembling on metal, an intolerable keening noise.  "It's just good strategy.  We can't wait.  We can't--can't leave him with them." 

He met Basqat's eyes and the rebel leader fell back a step.  "I understand," Basqat said.

Bruce closed the visor and stepped away from the small crowd on the stairs.  "Be well," he said briefly, and was gone into the sky.

Rish continued to weep, her face buried in her hands.  Harrn gathered her up in his arms and rocked her as the other rebels began to clear the destruction away.

 **: : :**

Clark was chained to a wall.  Nothing new there, he thought wryly.  He took stock.  His ribs ached and breathing was painful, but nothing seemed to be freshly broken.  His arms were stretched above his head, which was going to become agonizing very quickly without his powers.  His ankle was his most pressing worry:  putting weight on it sent twinges of pain through him.  A bad sprain at least.  Clark shifted his weight to his other leg and tried to collect his thoughts.  It was pitch-black in the room, but he got the impression it was fairly small.  Probably in the palace. 

A door opened, spilling harsh light from a blank corridor into the cell.  Clark's twin walked into the cell.  He waited for a moment, smiling, while Clark blinked against the light.  "So, we meet at last," he said conversationally, "This looks like rather a difficult situation for you, doesn't it?"  His voice was warm, almost cheerful.  "I remember one time when I was much younger, and I was captured by Ra's al-Ghul, held captive in a cell much like this one."  He nodded to himself, reminiscing.  "Of course, my brother and I got out of that one."  He sighed a little.  "It was right after that that we had sex for the first time.  We went flying together.  He was wearing black silk pajamas.  I remember the sounds he made when I took them off, the look on his face when I finally entered him for the first time.  It was paradise.  For both of us."  Kal-El chuckled a little, fondly.  "How we loved flying together."

He paced across the cell floor to stand in front of Clark.  "That's right," he said pensively, eyeing his captive's face, "Mother told me you had some of my memories.  Did you get that one?"  No answer.  "Well, it hardly matters, as you can't take him flying any more, can you?" 

He reached out and slowly, deliberately tore the linen robes away from Clark's chest.  "It's me he loves, you know," he noted. "His brother.  You're just a pathetic shadow, a makeshift he passed the time with until he could finally be with me again."  Carefully, lightly, he sketched the familiar symbol across Clark's chest with a fingernail.  "You're nothing."  Beads of scarlet welled up behind it.  "Nothing at all."

Kal-El stepped back and admired his handiwork:  both the bloody symbol and the look on the other man's face.  He licked his finger delicately.  "I'll be back for you later," he said.  "When he's forgotten you, and I can take my time."

He turned away.  //Did I say it right?// he thought as he left the room.

//You were perfect.//  Satisfaction tinged Saturn Queen's thoughts.

//I'd rather have ripped his lungs out, Mother,// he thought peevishly.

//Trust me, beloved son, you've hurt him much more this way.//

Reassured, he grinned with relish and kicked the door shut, plunging the room into blackness again behind him.

  



	15. Escaping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clark finds unlikely help--and the means by which to save himself and Bruce.

It was dark.  Very dark, and very quiet.

There was a moment when the whole palace shook, and footsteps pounded briefly by the door, but no one came to open it.

Clark worked on his manacle until he could feel blood running down his wrists, mostly for something to do.  The blood on his chest dried and began to itch.

He began to get thirsty.

A slit in the door opened and light flooded the room.  Clark blinked and squinted until he could make out a pair of wide hazel eyes, peering through the rectangle of brightness.  The owner of the eyes seemed to be on tip-toe.  Clark cleared his throat, and the slit slammed shut, leaving him in darkness again.

About ten minutes later, the door swung open.  A child's head peeked around the door:  a girl, her dark auburn hair pulled back in a braid.  She was carrying a plate with bread and a cup of water.  "I'm...supposed to give you some," she whispered.  "The Lord Kal-El sent me."

She had to stretch to hold the cup to his lips;  warm water sloshed on his face and he drank as much as he could.  "What's your name?" he asked after he swallowed.

Her eyes darted nervously to the door and back, to the door and back.  "It's...it's Dela."

"Dela," he said, and forced himself to smile at her.  She started and backed toward the door.  "Don't be afraid, Dela, I--"

The door swung shut with finality.

Clark tested his ankle.  It was going to be hard to walk on once he and Bruce got out of here.

It was very dark.

The little girl, Dela, came again later with a chamberpot, which was extremely embarrassing but better than the shame of soiled clothing.  "Dela," he said again as she turned to go, "Why are you serving him?"

Huge hazel eyes blinked at him.  "He is...the Lord Kal-El.  Isn't...isn't he?"  She looked at his face carefully and her eyes went wide with surmise, but she still disappeared out the door and left him in darkness.

A long time went by.

The next time Dela appeared with water, Clark waited until he could tell she was studying his face.  "Dela.  Please.  You know the man you call Lord Kal-El is a wicked man.  Please.  I have to get out of here, I have to get free to defeat him and free Kandor."  _Somehow._   "I swear to you, Dela, there's a better way."

She stared at him for a long moment, then reached out and almost touched the dried blood on his chest, the symbol etched into his skin.  She bit her lip, then bolted out the door in silence.

Clark sighed into the dark.

The next time the door opened, the girl slipped into the room and reached into her pocket to produce a set of keys.  Clark felt hope leap in him as she quietly unlocked his manacles.  He winced as he lowered his aching arms, gasping at the pain. 

The girl was watching him gravely.  "You are the true Kal-El.  I can tell.  The true Lord." 

Clark felt anything but lordly at the moment.  "I am Kal-El, yes," he said shortly.  "Thank you."  He took a step forward and his sprained ankle almost gave out.  "I don't know exactly what use I can be, but thank you."

Dela hesitated.  "There is a room--a room in which the Lor--the other man recharges his energies.  There are great lamps there, of yellow light.  He stands in them and grows strong."

This was better than Clark had hoped for.  "Can you take me there?"

The sleek auburn head bowed.  "Of course."  Then she raised her head and looked at him for a long moment.  "My Lord...there is something I must tell you."

"Please don't call me that," he protested, smiling to soften the rebuke.

Dela bit her lip.  "You--know the Lord Nightwing?"

Clark felt sick worry grip him.  " _Yes._   Is he all right?"

Dela dropped her eyes.  "He was captured," she whispered.  "They were waiting for him, and they captured him."

Clark's hands were fists.  "Show me that room, the sun room, and I'll go save him."  He hobbled past her toward the door, trying to prompt her to move, but she remained where she was, her eyes fixed on the ground.  "Dela!  We have to hurry!"

"My Lord," she said, her voice so low he had to strain to hear it, "He shares the other Kal-El's bed.  I've seen him there.  Laughing and calling him brother.  And--" She broke off, a blush coming to her face.

It was very dark.  Clark leaned against a wall for a moment;  the pain in his ankle was very bad.  "No," he said.

"My Lord--!"

"No."  He cut her off with a sweep of his hand, looking, although he didn't know it, quite regal.  "Impossible.  He may be there.  He may even pretend to be his lover.  But he loves _me._ "  Dela stared at him.  "Take me to the room with the lamps."

She led the way.  Clark limped after her as quickly as he could.

 **: : :**

The second guard collapsed and Clark dropped his makeshift bludgeon to check their pulses.  He had gotten lucky;  the two guards had seemed half-asleep and hardly noticed Clark hobbling up to them with a pipe behind his back.  He and Dela dragged the unconscious guards into the room and swung the heavy metal doors shut.

The room was cavernous, the machine at the center of it massive and looming.  Six huge panels focused on a platform in the middle.  Against the wall were banks of controllers that looked like a supercomputer.  The whole thing hummed gently.  "Do you know how to start it?" he asked Dela.

The girl was clearly afraid, yet she gathered her courage and went to the machine.  "I think it was this button...and this one..."

The panels brightened with a deep bass pulse, yellow light filling the room.  Clark stepped onto the platform and let the light bathe his body.  As Dela watched wide-eyed, the light cuts on his chest started to heal, leaving the dried blood on unmarked skin.  She reached out to rub the blood away with a sleeve, but Clark stopped her hand.  "Leave it," he said softly.  She backed away, still staring at him.

Clark closed his eyes, letting the golden light wash over him.  After a few minutes he spoke, his eyes still closed:  "It's not enough.  It's not fast enough."

Dela's voice was timid.  "It takes _him_ about four hours every time."

Bright blue eyes snapped open, lit with gold.  " _I don't have four hours._ "  Clark stared at the machine.  "There must be some other way--!"

The girl took a trembling breath.  "My Lord...at times when he needed his energy back quickly, he..." Her voice faltered.

"He what?  Please, Dela, tell me."

Dela went to a panel on the massive control mechanism and opened it to reveal a dark hollow beyond.  "If he put a person in here, touching this--"  She pointed to a horizontal metal bar.  "--He could recharge in about ten minutes."  Her voice shook as she continued.  "He used my brother for it once."

Clark's face was bleak.  "What does it do to the person?" he asked as if he already knew the answer.  Tears welled up in the girl's eyes and he slammed a fist against the side of the machine, making her jump.  "Sadistic bastards!"

Dela threw back her head, stung.  "It was an _honor_ for us!  The highest honor!  To give your life energy for the Lord was a great privilege!"

Clark continued to stare into the dark niche as if it nauseated him.  "Some other way.  There's got to be some other way," he muttered.

"My Lord..."  Dela's voice trembled and there were beads of sweat on her brow, but she squared her chin and continued.  "My Lord, my life can save the city.  Use it.  Use it, I beg you."

 _"No."_   Clark's voice was anguished.

"Then you'll fail, and he'll win.  He'll win everything."  Dela threw herself to her knees, hands clasped.  "I believe in you, Lord.  Accept my offering, freely given, and arise in glory to save us all."

For a long moment Clark stared at his fist, still clenched against the side of the machine.  When he looked at Dela again, his eyes were clear and steady.  "Wait for me in the hall.  I'll be there soon."

Dela backed away a few steps, then followed his gaze to the slumped forms of the two guards.  She hesitated once more, eyes wide.  "Go," Clark said softly.  "I'll just be a few minutes."

The girl went out in the hall, and the great steel door clanged shut behind her.  She waited, crouched and shivering, and after ten minutes the door opened again.

Kal stood there, head thrown back, his mouth set, the blood on his healed chest stark and clear.  "I'm ready," he said.  "Take me to my brother."

Dela stared at him, fear and hope struggling on her face.  Then she bowed, deeply, and moved down the hall.  Kal followed her.

He was no longer limping.


	16. Rescuing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After visiting the false Kal-El's solar recharging room, Clark goes to confront his doppleganger and Saturn Queen.

The corridors were silent as Kal strode down them after Dela.  The little girl kept glancing back warily, and Kal tried to smile reassuringly at her.  The tatters of what should have been his wedding robe hung in shreds around him, and the symbol of the House of El was traced on his chest in his own blood.  The girl shivered and looked away, hurrying down the echoing marble halls.

They finally came to a doorway finely wrought in gold.  There were no guards outside it.  Kal rested both hands against the shining metal as if he would wrest them from their hinges, closed his eyes and took a deep breath.  Then he merely lifted the latch and swung them open, almost gently, the metal making a sweet, resonant sound.

Kal stepped into the room, Dela a few steps behind him.

The room was dominated by a huge four-poster bed, hung with gauze drapery.  Bruce lay in the center of the bed, his arms stretched above his head and his hands under a large pillow.  His eyes were closed, his face flushed.  The Lord Kal-El lay beside him in full costume, one hand splayed across his bare chest and the other tangled gently in his dark hair, stroking it.  As the doors opened, he looked up at the interloper and smiled lazily, then stood to face the other man, giving Bruce a reassuring pat on the cheek as he moved.

"Come to try and take what you think is yours?" the Lord of Kandor sneered, his arms crossed.

Bruce's eyes opened slowly, clouded with sleep, lust, or something else.  "Clark," he whispered thickly.

Kal stepped into the room until he was just a few paces from his doppelganger.  Behind him, Dela made a small, shocked sound, and the Lord Kal-El smiled.  "Mother," he said, addressing a person behind Kal.

Kal could hear rustling silk from the doorway, but didn't take his eyes off the other man.  "You're not Kal-El," he said evenly.  "And I'm here to stop you.  Stop you from hurting Kandor and hurting the people I love."  His eyes were turquoise-bright and unwavering.  "I will not let you continue this travesty."

The other man made a scoffing noise, full of contempt.  "What are you going to do to stop me, worm?"

Dela made a hissing noise.  "You'll see," she whispered. 

"I found your sun room," Kal said. 

A brief flicker crossed the man's face, replaced quickly by a sneer.  "You're nothing," he said.  "I told you.  You're nothing."

Saturn Queen moved until Kal could see her out of the corner of his eye.  He didn't turn to face her, continuing to focus on his twin.  "You're not as strong as me," he said evenly.  "You never were and you never will be.  If you fight me, I will defeat you."  His face was cold and calm.

The Lord of Kandor's face twisted.  "I fucked your boyfriend," he snarled.  "Fucked him better than you ever could.  He begged me for more every time, and I gave it to him."

From the bed, Bruce made a sound like he was drowning.  "No," he murmured.

Kal smiled, very slightly, and his opponent flinched for the first time.  "Don't worry, Bruce," he said, his eyes never leaving the eyes so similar--and so different--from his.  "My brother."  His voice was a caress, but his unmoving gaze was like ice.

"I'll kill you," gritted his twin.

The small smile didn't leave Kal's face.  "No, you will not.  You will stand down, and you will allow us to go.  Because you fear me, and you fear what I will most certainly do to you."

Saturn Queen was silent, but her body was tense and her face strangely avid.  Behind Kal, Dela's breath was fast and short.

The man who resembled Kal-El stood, trembling, his hands clenching and unclenching at his sides.  "You--" he choked.  "You--"

"Stand down," Kal repeated, like steel and arctic wind.

With an abrupt gasp of breath, the other man's posture slumped, and he backed up a step.  "Damn you," he muttered.

Kal moved cautiously toward the bed, still watching his double.  "We're going to leave now, and you're not going to stop us.  We--"

Saturn Queen sucked in a breath of air and there was a shrill scream, full of hatred, from the girl at the door.  " _Just kill him!_ "  Dela's hands clawed the air, her eyes wild.  "He took your name, your city, your lover, everything!  He'll kill us all if you don't stop him!  You _can't_ let him live!  You _can't!"_  

There was a sudden movement from the bed, blankets scattering, and Bruce was next to Dela, hitting her with a punch that cut her shrieks off abruptly. 

At the same instant, Saturn Queen clutched her head and crumpled into a heap.

Bruce moved to stand next to Kal, rubbing wrists raw from restraints he had worked free during Kal's attention-grabbing speech.  He shook his dark head as if to clear it.  "I'm a bit drugged up," he muttered, "But I could see the expressions on both their faces.  Perfectly identical.  Eager."

Kal's double stared wildly at Saturn Queen's still form.  "Mother!  Mother!"  He glared at the two men.  "I'll kill you for that!"  He squinted, focusing his eyes--and nothing happened.  Looking confused, he leaped into the air at them--and fell on his face.

As he staggered to his feet, Bruce walked up to him and knocked him back into the wall with an uppercut. 

Blood trickled from the erstwhile Lord of Kandor's mouth, and he licked at it incredulously, dazed.  "What?  What?"

Clark stared at the powerless man, looking sick.  "She sabotaged his last charging session," he murmured, appalled.  "So I'd have full powers and he wouldn't.  So I'd...I'd..."

"So you'd kill him outright with one punch," Bruce finished for him.  "Kill him, save me...and with some extra mental push from her, be ready to take your place at her side again."

The dazed, bleeding man seemed to only just be grasping this.  "No," he choked.  He started to sob, tears leaking from disbelieving blue eyes.  "Mother wouldn't do that to me!  Mother loves me!"  He touched the blood at the corner of his mouth and stared at his wet fingers.  "No!"  He sank to the floor, then lifted his head to howl, " _I just want to go home!"_

As if he had summoned it, the wall behind him shimmered, shifted, and became a swirling gate.  Two figures emerged to stand behind Kal's doppelganger. 

One was a man with the same sharp jawline, the same confident stance, as Bruce Wayne, but dressed in a costume of steel feathers and gray leather:  Owlman, Tommy Wayne, Bruce's brother in another dimension.

The other was a woman with a familiar mocking smile and dark hair, head thrown back and a golden lariat of her side:  Superwoman, Lois Lane's twin.

Owlman's eyes flicked between the two duplicates, then settled on the one sniveling against the wall.  "Kent," he said shortly.  "It got boring without you."

Superwoman smirked.  "It's just no fun cheating on you if you're not around to sulk about it."

Ultraman's eyes cleared through the tears.  "Tommy!  Lois!"  For a second, something like joy lit his voice.  "Where the fuck have you been, leaving me in this god-rotted place for so fucking long?"

Owlman sneered as he dragged Ultraman to his feet.  "This little jaunt is going to cost you a shitload of favor, Kent.  You'd better start thinking of... _inventive_ ways to pay us off."  His voice was redolent of future humiliations.

"What about them?"  Superwoman was eyeing Bruce and Kal speculatively, tapping her lasso at her side.  They had shifted back into combat positions--both of them half-naked, Bruce's eyes still bleary, Kal smeared with his own blood, they still looked quite ready to put up a good fight.

Owlman made a small huffing sound and addressed the two heroes.  "Look.  We could duke it out here.  It could even be a lot of fun.  But that gate's only going to stay open another couple of minutes, so unless you want to risk us getting stuck on this side, I suggest we skip the festivities." He shot Superwoman a look.  "Lois.  You're not going to get a fivesome out of this, so don't even think of it."

Superwoman grinned unrepentantly, but started to help haul Ultraman back to the gate.

"Wait," said Ultraman abruptly.  He grabbed the unconscious form of Saturn Queen by her copper hair and yanked.  "Take her with us."  Lois and Tommy glanced at each other and shrugged;  Lois stepped forward to lift the other woman into her arms. 

Ultraman chuckled.  "You always wanted a pet telepath to test some of your toys on, Tommy.  She should do fine."

Owlman waited a moment longer to see if Bruce and Clark were going to try and stop them, then stepped backwards into the portal, bowing mockingly as it swirled shut behind them.  The last thing they heard as it closed were Ultraman and Owlman:

"I'm totally going to kill you when I get my powers back, Tommy."

"In your dreams, Kent."

There was a long silence after the gate shut.  Then suddenly Clark dragged in a long, whooping breath like a sob.

Bruce snorted with relief.  "They're tough even when I'm fully equipped.  At least you could have put up a fight."

Clark took a step toward the bed;  his ankle gave out and he collapsed onto it.  "No," he gasped, almost laughing. "No, I couldn't."

Bruce looked blank.  "You--what?"

"There wasn't time.  And I couldn't--I couldn't bear--I was bluffing, Bruce.  I don't have a scrap of power.  I can hardly even walk."

Bruce stared at him.  Then, slowly, he started to laugh.  "You were bluffing.  You lunatic."  He shook his head.  "You magnificent lunatic."  He sat down on the bed next to Clark and gathered him into his arms.  "Beautiful," he whispered, kissing him on the chest just above the bloody symbol.  "You were beautiful."  For a moment, he just rested his head on Clark's chest, listening to the heart beating beneath him.  "When did you figure out the girl was being controlled?"

Clark laughed shortly.  "Quite a bit after you did.  I only sent her out of the sun room because I didn't want her to be afraid for me, give me away."  He looked suddenly alarmed and his arms tightened around Bruce.  " _Mithen,_ did he--did he--"

"No."  Clark went limp with relief as Bruce continued.  "Saturn Queen wouldn't let him.  She probably didn't want me to associate your face with violation.  She did want me to stay with you and love you, after all."

Clark touched his face, his hand shaking slightly.  "Stay with me and love me," he said softly.  "Bruce.  Bruce.  _From your jail return to joy."_

 __Bruce kissed the palm of Clark's hand, his eyes fixed on Clark's, something indefinably new in the lines of his face.

"Yes," he said simply.  "I'll try."

The girl in the corner groaned and stirred;  Bruce kissed Clark once and got up to lift her gently and place her on the bed, smoothing back her auburn hair.  "She should be fine," he said, checking her pulse and breathing.  "She just needs to rest."

"Like us."

"Like us," Bruce repeated with a hint of a smile.  "But there are a few things we have to do first."  
 _  
_ **: : :** _  
_  
The palace guards fell back as the two shining avatars hovered above the palace.  The black-armored knight was battered, but it only served to make him look more menacing.  The golden armor shone like a mythical yellow sun.  They hung in the air like bladed ornaments, bright and dangerous.

None emerged from within to challenge them.

Flamebird raised his sword in a salute and spoke:  "Have now hope!  Look to the heavens!"  The sweetness, the beauty of his voice was ineffable, and many of the listening Kandorians found tears standing in their eyes.

"Too long have you walked in darkness," Flamebird continued.  "Worshiping where no fealty should be, letting a false king twist your hearts.  You have allowed your brethren of Kandor to be hurt merely for their outward appearance rather than their true hearts.  How could you, my people?"  His grief and disappointment wrung their hearts;  the rightness of his sorrow was undeniable.

"The false lord and his Queen are gone now," said Nightwing.  "Turn from your errors today, turn back to the true light of Rao and of Yuda, to their love and their wisdom.  Embrace your siblings, whatsoever they may look like."  He paused.  "You have made hurtful decisions.  Wrong decisions.  But know that forgiveness and mercy are infinite where there is love."  The promise of redemption in his voice was balm, the hope of compassion irresistible.  "Infinite."

Flamebird rested golden fingers gently on Nightwing's shoulder and continued where the black knight had fallen silent.  "We leave you now to make a better world.  We have faith in you.  Always."

And then they were gone.

 **: : :**

 ****"You should have taken the time to recharge before we destroyed the lamps.  Now I have to nurse you through a sprained ankle too."  Bruce's concerned tone through the comlink belied his sardonic words.

"We couldn't take the chance of someone taking advantage of them.  Besides, maybe I just like having you fuss over me."  Clark smiled as Bruce's sigh huffed through the speakers.  "So.  We drop the armor off with Basqat and Van-Zee and--"

"Not yet.  We're stopping someplace else first."  Clark made a questioning sound, and Bruce's voice turned indignant.  "Do you _really_ think I'm letting you get out of this?  Not a chance in hell."

 **: : :**

Bine had heard the rumors spreading through the city, so she wasn't shocked to see the two figures picking their way down the aisle through the rubble, but she smiled in delight as they approached.  Red light streamed through the shattered stained-glass windows in scarlet shafts, bathing them in crimson.  Klar was leaning heavily on Brus;  they were both naked to the waist.  They stopped in front of Bine, exhausted and battered.

Bine stood up and lightly touched the dried bloody symbol on Klar's chest.  "Rish told me," she said.  "Why didn't you tell me, child, and save an old woman some foolishness?"

"I'm sorry," Klar said meekly.  "I didn't know how.  I'm just a man."

She laughed shortly but didn't press the point.

"Will you marry us?" said Brus.  "Now?  Here?  I'm not taking the chance someone is going to steal him again."

Bine looked at Klar;  he nodded.  "He seems to have his mind fixed on it, and I've learned not to contradict him."  His face was bright with joy.  "Do we really need the robes, the candles, all that?  What's the simplest form of the ceremony that's binding?"

Bine moved to the altar and removed a set of ribbons from a drawer, maroon and white.  "Clasp your hands together," she said, and the two men did so.  She looped the white ribbons around Clark's wrist and forearm and the red ones around Bruce's, twining them together about their hands.  Then she cleared her throat and rested her hands lightly on the ribbon-linked ones.

"Today we come before Rao and Yuda to witness the joining of two lives in love, the beginning of a new life together."  She looked at Brus.  "Brus-We, you are here today--"

"Bruce," he interrupted her, "Bruce Wayne.  That's my true name."

Bine made a small, huffy noise to hide the fact that Kal's smile made her want to weep.  "Very well.  Bruce Wayne, you are here today to pledge your life to this man.  Do you state here that you will love, respect, honor and adore your chosen one all your life and with all your being?  If so, say 'I do.'"

Bruce paused so long that Bine would have been worried if he hadn't been staring at the other man's face, clearly savoring the moment.  "I do," he said eventually.

Bine turned her attention to Klar.  "I'll ask before I begin this time--what name is your true one?"

He paused and looked a bit lost.  "My parents named me Kal-El.  But I'm also Clark Kent.  I guess...I guess they're both true names."

"You just have to make this complicated, don't you?" sighed Bine.  "Very well, let's be on the safe side."  She lifted her voice again.  "Clark Kent, Kal-El, you are here today to pledge your life to this man.  Do you state here that you will love, respect, honor and adore your chosen one all your life and with all your being?  If so, say 'I do.'"

"I do," said Clark almost before she was done speaking.  Under the ribbons, Bruce's hands tightened on his.

Bine very gently unwrapped the ribbons from their hands.  Then she ceremoniously gave Clark the scarlet ribbons from Bruce's hands, and Bruce the white from Clark's.  "These ribbons symbolize the love and the faith of your _ilyon_.  Keep them always as a reminder that he cherishes you above his own happiness, his own honor, his own life.  In Rao's joy, in Yuda's wisdom, I hereby proclaim that you who were once twain are now one life."  A long beat.  "You can let go of each other now," Bine said, waving her hand between them to break their gaze.

"Never," said Bruce, laughing.

Clark turned to Bine.  "Thank you," he said.

She bowed.  "It was my honor, Lord Kal-El."  Then she lifted her head to let him see she was grinning rather mockingly.  "Klar.  Clark.  Flamebird.  Whoever else you may be."

"That's easy," said Clark lightly, nodding at Bruce.  "I'm his _ilyon."_

They walked down the aisle together through the rubble, across the crushed flowers, dressed in rags and tatters, bloodied and unbowed.

At the doorway of the church they paused.  Outside, Kryptonians and aliens together were finishing clearing rubble from the fountain at the center of the square.  The alien mariachi band was gathering to practice.  Harrn was tuning a very small instrument like a banjo.  Far across the plaza a small green figure was helping a spidery shape set up a fruit stand.  She waved wildly when she saw them on the steps. 

"Nice place," said Bruce.  "We'll have to come back and visit sometimes."

"We have to get out of here first," noted Clark.

Bruce waved a dismissive hand.  "With access to the communications systems and technology in the palace?  Piece of cake."

"Speaking of which...I hope you can get us out before they decide to make us cut our way out of one."

Bruce shuddered.  "Extra incentive."

The mariachi band started playing something like a tango.  "Well," said Clark, "Time to get to work, I suppose."

"Wait."  Bruce hooked his arm around Clark's waist.  "I think we have time for one dance, don't you?  Our first dance as a married couple?"

Klar danced with Brus.

Superman danced with Batman.

Clark danced with Bruce.

It was a beautiful dance.

  



	17. Returning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce and Clark return to their own world and are greeted by their comrades and family.

Kara Zor-El unlocked the massive doors of the Fortress of Solitude and flew inside unchallenged.  That was strange, the damn dog was usually right there, growling at her when she came to check on him.  "Krypto?  Krypto?" 

Superman had been missing for over a month, as had Batman, and of course it had fallen to Kara to take care of the dog.  Kara heard a low, unhappy whining from somewhere in the Fortress, and she sighed and started to search for Krypto more carefully.  To tell the truth, although she never would have admitted it to anyone, she was starting to get a little worried about her foster-fathers.  Everyone kept telling her not to worry, that there had been no sign of a struggle, that there probably was some perfectly reasonable explanation as to why the world's two greatest heroes might have abruptly vanished.  They'd probably had to go undercover somewhere.  And not mention it.  To anybody.

Kara was definitely getting worried, but since no one else seemed to be, she tried to keep a brave face.

She heard the whining suddenly shift into desperate barking, and hurried to find the source.  She finally located the dog standing and barking wildly in front of...the bottle that held Kandor?

Why would Krypto be barking at Kandor?

Kara pulled the dog away from the bottle, and he turned to slobber on her briefly before lunging back at the bottle, yelping.  Kara stared at him, wild surmise blossoming in her mind.

She ran to call Dick Grayson and the JLA.

 **: : :**

The word got around quickly, and by the time the machinery had been repaired to bring Clark and Bruce back, a fair number of heroes had gathered in the Fortress.  Dick and Tim were there, of course, helping Kara puzzle out the Kryptonian technology.  Oracle was giving advice via comlink.  Diana hovered nearby, watching anxiously.  Hal kept asking if he could use some constructs to help and being told they had things under control, thank you.  Dinah and Green Arrow had hitched a ride with Hal and were sparring to kill some time in a corner.  Even the Martian Manhunter had materialized from somewhere and was waiting almost motionlessly nearby.

Kara decided that for a bunch of people who had been telling her not to worry for a month, they seemed fairly concerned.

The first time they threw the switch it gave out in a burst of sparks.  Tim muttered a variety of words that drew a frown from Dick.  Wonder Woman tapped a foot impatiently, and Tim blushed slightly and bent to his task again.

The second time they threw the switch there was a sputtering buzz, a hum, a scattering beam of light--and the two men were standing in the middle of the ring of heroes.

Clark's hair was rather rumpled and he stepped away from Bruce quickly with a grin as Kara flung herself into his arms.  "Kal!" She pulled back to eye his clothing appreciatively.  "You look really good in Kryptonian clothes, cousin.  Totally rocking."

Behind them, Dick and Tim were glaring daggers at Bruce.  "Damn it, I've been worried sick!" they both exclaimed in unison, then did a comedic double take at each other. 

"You didn't seem worried!" Tim said.

"What?  I had to be in charge, I couldn't afford to look worried!  It might worry you!" Dick retorted.  He tapped his ear and cocked his head.  "Of course I was, O, but I wasn't going to let on!  Hey, stop laughing, you--"

Bruce stepped forward and wrapped his arms around both of them at once, leaving them with identical shocked expressions.

Clark, meanwhile, was explaining to the rest of the gathered heroes the basics of what had happened:  the kidnapping, the resistance movement, the fight against the villains.  No one there had heard of Saturn Queen, but they rolled their eyes at mention of Ultraman.

The Fortress of Solitude rang with happy voices, loud with relief.  Side conversations developed, discussions eddying around as everyone took turns to shake hands or clap the backs of the returned heroes.  Tim was grilling Bruce on the design specs of the armor, Diana was scowling at Clark's description of the battles, Hal and Ollie were having a spirited argument about whether Ultraman was a rightist or leftist dictator, Krypto was barking at everyone to pay attention to him, and J'onn was just standing and watching it all impassively, his arms across his chest.  Meanwhile, Kara had spotted the braid of maroon ribbons hanging from Clark's belt and was staring at it, her hands over her mouth.

Tim and Dick abruptly became aware that Bruce's attention had wandered.  Their mentor was staring across the room at Clark, who was limpingly acting out one of the fights he had as Flamebird, arms held up like wings.  Clark saw Bruce's gaze and fell silent, looking awkward.  The rest of the heroes felt the sudden tension between the two and stopped their conversations as well, watching them.  Even Krypto stopped yapping and lapsed into panting, his adoring eyes on Clark.

Bruce pointed across the room at Clark, almost accusingly.  "You know I don't consider this over between us.  Not by a long shot."  Clark looked confused, and Bruce continued, "I still say nothing's final until we settle it here, in this world, in front of everybody."

Clark's expression shifted to shock and something else.  "Bruce," he started, then stopped to gather his thoughts.  "You know I'm...satisfied with the results.  We don't have to go through all that again--you have nothing to prove to anyone here, I've got nothing to prove.  You can just leave it be."

Bruce scowled and jabbed his finger at Clark.  "What are you, afraid?  I'm telling you, I'm willing to do it again.  No--in fact, I _want_ to do it again.  You name the time, you name the place, I'll be there."  A flicker of something uncertain crossed his face.  "Your choice.  You can back down if you want.  Here's your chance."

The other heroes were frozen in place, watching Batman and Superman face each other down.  They all seemed appalled.  Only J'onn was unmoved, even smiling slightly. 

Hal Jordan finally broke the silence, stepping in between the two men as if stepping in front of a firing squad.  "Now, there's no reason to let things get tense here, guys.  I know you've had your differences in the past, but there's no need to let things break down into open hostilities, or some kind of...crazy challenge to duel."

Clark was still staring at Bruce's black scowl.  He suddenly broke into a sweetly goofy smile.  The corners of Bruce's frown twitched, but he held steady.  "Have it your way," Clark almost whispered.

"I generally do," Bruce pointed out, crossing his arms on his chest.

Clark nodded, still smiling.  "There's no reason to rush.  Let's take a little time to make some plans, discuss the details."

"Chocolate cake," Bruce said with finality.

Clark barked a laugh and made a beckoning gesture, like an invitation to fight.  "Oh, go ahead and push me some more.  You want to settle things right here?  We can do that.  Here and now, big talker."

Bruce spread his hands placatingly.  "Just wanted to make that one point clear.  The rest is negotiable."

Oliver Queen looked confused.  "So, wait.  Am I getting this?  There's going to be some kind of smackdown between Superman and Batman, and chocolate cake will be served?"

Clark patted Green Arrow on the back.  "Something like that, Ollie.  I'll explain later."

Kara blurted out something in Kryptonian as if she couldn't possibly stay silent a moment longer. 

Bruce answered her in the same language, and Kara burst into laughter.  Then she sobered abruptly, her face shifting mercurially to deeply solemn.  She went to Bruce and embraced him almost ceremoniously, kissing him on the cheek with great formality.  "Bruce Wayne, you deserve everything you are going to get," she intoned. 

Then she flew to the door and stood for a moment, silhouetted with her fist in the air.  "YES!" she yelled, then flew off, laughing so hard she could hardly fly straight.

The other heroes watched her go.  Dick and Tim shared speculative looks, the worry on their faces shifting into something like delight.

Hal scratched the back of his head.  "Never seen someone get so happy over a duel.  Strange girl."

Still laughing, Clark saw off Dinah, Ollie, and Hal together.  Ollie stopped at the door and turned to Clark.  "Chocolate cake--" he broke off and snapped his fingers in revelation.  "Is this some kind of Iron Chef cooking showdown?  Because if so, change it to chili and I'll trounce both of you!"

"Sorry, Ollie," Clark said, "This is really between the two of us.  Man to man, so to speak."  He was still chuckling as they disappeared into the Arctic sky.

Diana gave both men another hug and flew off in turn, looking confused but not worried.  The Martian Manhunter had quietly disappeared at some point.  Clark walked with Bruce, Dick, and Tim to the teleporters.  "I'm sure you have a lot of catching up to do, Bruce.  I know I will."

Bruce nodded.  "Maybe I'll see you in a few days."  He took his place on the teleport pad between the boys. 

Clark paused with his hands on the controls to take in Bruce's face again.  No one who saw the look that passed between them then would have continued to believe they were in any kind of conflict. 

"I'll be thinking of you, _ilyon_.  And looking forward to the day," Bruce said.

"I'll be thinking of you too, _mithen._   My heart," Clark said softly.  He touched the controls and sent the trio off;  like Cheshire Cats, Dick and Tim's smiles seemed to hover in the air when they were gone.

The Fortress seemed even more quiet than usual with everyone gone.  Yet the silence seemed, somehow, to hold potential for something else.  Clark padded across the floor to the massive door Kara had left open and tugged at it, then broke out laughing;  he didn't have his powers back.

The midnight sun was hovering above the horizon, long rays of rich golden light stretching across the icy waste, reaching up to the Fortress door like a path of amber.  Clark let the light bathe him, feeling the pain in his ankle ease slightly, and closed his eyes, sighing.  "From your jail return to joy," he murmured, feeling light kissing his eyelids, his hair, his lips. 

 **: : :**

So my tale is told and ended,  
    So I charge you now, my children:  
Forget not Nightwing and Flamebird,  
    Fair and kingly, Krypton's finest!  


  


  



	18. The Saga of Nightwing & Flamebird [Abridged]

_**The Saga of Nightwing & Flamebird [Abridged]**_  
*coughs*  A few people have asked if the _Sagas_ I kept referring to in the latest arc were of my own making.  Blasphemy, I say!  The _Saga of Nightwing & Flamebird_ is known to all Kryptonian and Kandorian children!  And while waiting in line at grocery stores or in doctor's waiting rooms, I studied them very carefully in the original Kryptonian to use as source material for the arc.

So just in case you want to know how totally insane I am (you probably already know, so this will merely be confirmation), I have transcribed just a few key stanzas (fifteen, to be precise) from the original 240-stanza epic.

Coincidentally, the _Sagas_ happen to match up nicely with the form of old Norse alliterative verse found in _Beowulf_ and other Anglo-Saxon poems.  Go figure.

In the days before the darkness  
    When the brave and bold still flourished,  
In the golden-gated city,  
    Lor Shah Mal, the ever-shining  
Rose a lord of lightless cruelty,  
    Bin-Alon of bitter memory.  
With his sword and spells he slew them,  
    The true kings of that fair country.  
All the land in fear then foundered;  
    Hope was lost in deepest horror.  
 _  
[Stanzas 2-13 detail the despair and suffering of the land]_

Then rose up the noble Nightwing,  
    Worthiest of Krypton's warriors,  
To counter all the dark king's cruelty,  
    To bring pure peace back to the people.  
Violet eyes alight with valor,  
    Black his armor, burnished brightly.  
His beauty bright shone through the darkness--  
    Nightwing, Krypton's greatest captain!

Also then arose the Flamebird,  
    Nightwing's friend, his fairest comrade.  
Golden wings all gilt in glory;  
    Son of the sun, a soul of passion.  
Shield of scarlet always ready  
    To protect and guard the people.  
Steadfast by the side of Nightwing--  
    Flamebird, lord of light and love!  
 _  
[Stanzas 16-40 are a detailed description of the lineage, history, appearance and personality of each hero. Highly tedious, I'm doing you a favor by trimming them]_

Bin-Alon, the vain and boastful,  
    Looked upon the land he lorded;  
Lor Shah Mal, the shining city  
    Humbled now beneath his heel.  
On the gates of gold he saw them,  
    Words of righteousness and rage:  
"Coward king and pale pretender,  
    Face us, fight us, craven foe!"

 _[Stanzas 42-66 are the first appearances of the heroes, their first clashes with the armies and minions of Bin-Alon.  
Stanzas 67-77 detail their early defeat and resolution to seek the gods for succor.]_

Through the country torn, they traveled  
    Robed in rags, their forms disguised.  
Searching always for salvation  
    For the help of hallowed hands.  
Their goodly garb they set aside  
    To walk the world as common wights,  
But all who saw them stopped to wonder--  
    Naught could mask their noble mien.  
 _  
[Stanzas 79-130 tell of those early quests and the friends and enemies they made.  The usual cast of helpful characters and archetypes, of course.  
Stanzas 131-170 detail the Time of Separation, where each hero struggles alone, climaxing with the Great Trials._

 _Flamebird is sent a vision by Bin-Alon to try and crush his spirit.]_

In the glass a vision glimmered:  
    A shining city crushed and cowed.  
Desolate, destroyed, abandoned,  
    Failed by Flamebird, lost forever!  
Then a voice of vile intentions,  
    Scornful, serpent-like, and sly,  
Spoke to Flamebird as he faltered,  
    Trapped in terror, gaze aghast.  
"Too late to save the ones you love--  
    Their foolish faith in you betrayed!  
Your hubris led them to this horror:  
    Blame and blight are yours alone!"

Sank he then in shame and sorrow,  
    Vision blurred by veils of tears.  
Dark despair assailed his soul,  
    And from his heart the hope departed.  
Flamebird knelt upon the flagstones,  
    Cold and cruel against his palms;  
Lone and lost in lamentation,  
    Mazed in mists of shattered joy.

But a sound came through the silence,  
    Through the haze of hopelessness:  
"Dear companion, destined comrade,  
    Hear me now and hearken well!  
Never shall this nightmare vision  
    Come to pass while we have power!  
Leave behind these lightless lies--  
    Trust in truth, believe your brother!"

 _[Meanwhile, Nightwing is trapped in his own nightmare vision]_

Then his heart was gripped by horror,  
    By a phantasm of fear:  
A thicket of the cruelest thorns  
    Growing round him, grim and strong.  
None could draw near, none defeat them;  
    Poniard-sharp, they pierced his heart.  
Then a wicked whisper found him,  
    Filled with poison and with pain:  
"Friendless and alone your fate is;  
    No one near you in the darkness.  
Perish now by thorns of pride  
    In the cage that you have crafted!"

Sharp and sure the thorns entrapped him,  
    In his throat they cut his cries.  
And his confidence did quail then,  
    Passion lost in pain and grief.  
But through agony and anguish,  
    Then came words of warmth and comfort:  
"Dearest friend and heart's desire,  
    Listen to your lover's voice!  
This dark image shall not daunt you;  
    I am here to hold you always.  
Break the bonds of these vain visions,  
    From your jail return to joy!"

 _[Stanzas 176-180 detail their reunion and travels together to the Great Volcano to meet with Rao and Yuda]_

In the maw of deepest mountains  
    In the pit of passion's flame,  
Flamebird bowed before the Father,  
    Rao the Kindler, King of all.  
Begged he then a boon, a favor,  
    From the Father, the Flame-Bringer:  
"Give to me a blade to brandish,  
    One to brighten heavy hearts."

On the peak so pure and frozen,  
    Cold and clear beneath the stars,  
Nightwing knelt before the Mother,  
    Wise and wondrous, gentle Yuda.  
Begged he then a boon, a favor,  
    From the Mother, the Moon-maker:  
"Give to me a staff of shadows,  
    One to daunt the souls of darkness."

 _[Stanzas 183-201 show their renewed fighting against Bin-Alon.  
Stanzas 202-228 are the great Final Battle, ending with the apparent self-sacrifice of the heroes]_

Then the mountain cracked and crumbled  
    Flame burst forth in deadly fountains;  
And the wizard's spells were shattered  
    Darkness lifted, light returning.  
But the heroes--holy, dauntless--  
    Came not back from that dark chasm.  
The city fair and free now flourished--  
    Its price was high, and paid in full!

Then, above the chants and cheering,  
    Clear above the wails and weeping,  
Came a call:  "Oh folk of Krypton,  
    Have now hope!  Look to the heavens!"  
In the sky there came a shining,  
    Clearest azure, brightest crimson;  
Spreading wings above the world--  
    The spirits pure of our protectors.  
Twined together in their glory,  
    Wonderful and vast, this vision!

Came there then the voice of valor,  
    From the phoenix soul of Flamebird:  
"Evildoers shall not enter  
    Through these gates while we do guard them."  
Also spoke the shade of Nightwing,  
    Infinite and indigo:  
"Let the wicked ones be warned now  
    Or face great wrath on our returning!"  
 _  
[232-240 are denouement and rebuilding, concluding with the closing half-stanza]_

So my tale is told and ended,  
    So I charge you now, my children:  
Forget not Nightwing and Flamebird,  
    Fair and kingly, Krypton's finest!  



End file.
